Spring Break!

This past week was spring break at school here and was supposed to be when my lovely big sister Ashley was meant to come visit, but unfortunately those plans fell through because I had other obligations for classes. So, the following is how I spent my spring break instead:


Orpheus Island Research StationSunday, September 26th 6:00am -Wednesday, September 29th 3:00pm



Those first few days of break I had a field trip to JCU's Orpheus Island Research Station out on the Great Barrier Reef. I had to wake up at 5am on Sunday morning to finish packing my things so that I could make it to the bus at 6am for departure. It was roughly an hour and half bus ride north of townsville and then a 30 minute boat ride out to the Island. The whole night before I had slept roughly 2 hours because I was working on getting a lot of my other assignments done so I had less work to worry about for break. The result was that i was really exhausted for the bus ride, but didn't end up falling asleep. We ended up at orpheus before noon and brought all of our stuff to the dorms (see top left picture) before throwing on our swimsuits and getting on the boats to get in the water for our first exercise. We swam along a transect that had a bunch of corals numbered and it was our job to identify which family they belonged to. We were encouraged to swim down and touch everything and anything, because sometimes you need to be able to feel the skeletal differences to really make a conclusion about the classification. That was awesome because usually when you go snorkeling or diving they tell you not to touch anything. After that we all hopped out and had some lunch, which turned out to be really amazing. It was mostly just fixings for sandwiches and a variety of fresh fruit, but they also had a fancy cheese platter with nice crackers and nutella and stuff like that. After lunch we got back in the water for another couple of hours to run an exercise about how benthic structure changes as you move from reef flat, to crest, to slope. This is basically how the next few days proceeded. Usually we'd have to be in our wetsuits and ready to get in the boats by 8:30, and we were responsible for waking up early enough to eat and take care of whatever else. This was no problem, except my roommate (and research buddy) decided to wake up at 6:30 every morning because that is how much time she needed to get ready. What the hell. And of course, when she woke up I woke up because she made so much noise and kept putting her alarm on snooze. Ridiculous. But yes, other than that, things went well. I got bitten by so many bugs and by the end of it i was really tired of running transects and looking at corals. They really aren't very exciting when you look at them. Luckily one day we finished one of our exercises early and we were able to free snorkel while everyone else was finishing up. We saw 3 giant cuttlefish and a wobbegong (this crazy shark thing). That was really cool. Towards the end we also got a talk on education after we finish undergrad or masters. Basically this whole trip and the talk made me realize that I'll probably never go on to further education and that it sounds like complete torture. I think i'll save myself the trouble because if I have to write more research papers I might just go jump off a bridge. They cause me too much stress and I don't enjoy doing it, so yes, no thank you. On the last day we had to do a station-wide cleanup, but it was okay because we ended up doing it quick and we had to wait for the tides to come in before we could leave so the boat could get out. This meant lots of sitting on the beach and working on my sweet tan (don't worry, i was generous with sunscreen application). The little beach outside our dorms (see picture 2, this was taken at low tide) made the perfect location for a little sunbaking and I was joined by some of my fellow classmates. This whole trip was a really great opportunity to get to meet them and find out they're actually pretty cool. I even met this one guy who would basically only speak spanish to me because he was excited to find another spanish speaker. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure I ended up giving myself a double ear infection because my ears were hurting like nobodies business. But yes, when I wasn't on the beach I was wading in the mangrove shallows and watching the sting rays and the little baby black tipped reef sharks, one of which swam basically a foot away from my leg. it was AWESOME. We ended up a little late on the boat and busride home so i didnt end up getting to my room until a little after 3. I was hoping to get there sooner, because I was supposed to be getting picked up for my next big adventure!
Airlie Beach
Wednesday, September 29th 3:15pm - Friday, October 1st, 4:00pm



So I had just rushed into my room at 3:15 lugging all of my crap from my orpheus island fieldtrip and I was in a hurry to repack because steph was picking me up so we could drive home to her house in Airlie Beach. Luckily, I had basically set out all the things I would need so i could just throw them in my bag and leave again. I threw my wetsuit and nasty towels out on the balcony, repacked my bags, hopped in the shower really quick because I was epically smelly (we were only allowed 3 minute showers on orpheus because the water supply was from rainwater) and then got dressed. By 4:00pm I was lugging all of my stuff over to the car park on the other side of Uni hall and getting into Steph's car for the 3-4 hour drive south to Airlie Beach. By the time I got in the car I was completely exhausted, but there was no time for sleeping because I was busy having some nice chats with steph and listening to some sweet tunes! We ended up getting into her house around 7:30pm. Her house is unlike any house I've ever been to. They live on 8 acres of land that used to be a sugar cane plantation. None of their lawn is mowed because it just takes so long, so the grass is like...waist to shoulder height. There is all sorts of crap all over their yard and house because her dad is a mover and he gets all sorts of new crap from people everyday, its kind of like a ridiculous antique store kind of? But yeah, it was still great. They have a chicken coop where they get fresh eggs, a flock of guinea foul (which are the ugliest birds on earth), and a paddock of fruit and nut trees ranging from mangoes, to mulberries, to lemon and mandarins, to avacados and something else i can't remember. It really was so fantastic. They also have passion fruit vines and cherry tomatoes growing all over the place. That night i got swept up in conversation with her dad, who is probably the quirkiest old man I have ever met, but he was really nice and entertaining and he was really excited that he had somebody new to talk to, so that was cute. He taught me all about the guinea foul and the sugarcane land, and about how house numbers x 100 signify the distance of the house in kilometers to the nearest main road. crazy. Her mom made some pretty good pasta for dinner, so it was really nice to have some delicious food for once. I got to meet one of her other brother's, michael, and her, her mom, and i spent the night just talking and sitting around and munching on an assortment of M&Ms. Her other brother, Daniel (my favorite) was stuck at work until late and ended up being delayed further by a flat tire he got driving home. He didn't end up home until after dinner around 8:30, but I was really excited to see him :) I was really excited for bedtime that night because I was so tired. I ended up sleeping in michaels bed because he went to spend the night at his girlfriends house. I was definitely okay with it, because it was probably the most comfortable bed I have ever slept in. I guess Michael came in in the morning because he had to grab a work-shirt and I was all sprawled out. He mentioned to steph she might want to wake me up otherwise I'd probably end up sleeping all day. She had to come and wake me at 11 haha. That day we kept it Low-key and just kind of hung out. We did a little shopping to try to find steph a dress for Val Ball but had no success. So we ended up just going to sit down by the lagoon to do a little tanning and to chat and hang out. Her mom ended up coming down to join us a little later in the afternoon for some chatting and sunbaking. Because her mom was working so hard with feeding us, steph and I decided we would make dinner that night. On the way home from the lagoon we stopped by the grocery to pick up some ingredients to make chicken schnitzel/chicken parmesan for dinner so that her mom wouldn't have to worry with dinner. Dinner ended up being great, of course, and the three of us ended up all working together in the kitchen, it was quite cute. Michael called his girlfriend so we could all have a nice family dinner and we all sat down and ate together. Unfortunately, after dinner i was informed that michael and his girlfriend would be staying at the house tonight so I was getting kicked out of the comfortable bed in his room. that was no good, but i ended up sleeping in a different bed anyway so it all worked out, just not as comfortably. After dinner steph and i showered and got ready for going out! Some of daniel's friends from Brisbane were in town for a few days and she was excited to see them and hang out, so we all went over to his friend Tai's house for some beverages and then hit up the town. Well, turns out all of these kids are professional alcoholics and can pound alcohol like nobody I have ever seen. After everyone had sufficiently pre-gamed we hopped in a taxi and went downtown to hit up the clubs. The night out was ridiculously fun and lots of crazy and silly dancing ensued. Lucky for me this kids are just as crazy as I am (in a good way) so we all had heaps of fun. We started out at evolutions where we were basically the only ones there because nobody really goes out on thursday nights. After busting a move there we moved to mama africa's which was completely packed because it is more of a foreigner/backpacker's club. This was the part where we took multiple photos of steph getting grinded on by a bunch of creepy guys..and then photos of her making out with them. hilarious. Steph doesn't make the best decisions when drunk, but we all kept an eye on her so it was okay. We ended up losing steph when we thought she had gone to the bathroom, so a few of us left to go find her. Turns out she had been sitting downstairs falling asleep against a wall and told people what her brother looked like in case he walked by. We found her fairly quick and then ended up back at evolutions to cap off the night. We tried to go to McDonalds to get some snacks, but some crazy was trying to start fights so we just went to the taxi area to wait for one to get home. At this point, steph was drunkenly laying on the sidewalk looking like a complete mess. We all got home safe and I had to help steph take off her purse and shoes so she could get into bed. poor thing. The next morning we all snuggled up in daniels bed to watch super troopers and eat breakfast. Steph made bacon and eggs with toast which was delicious. She also made baked beans which is a breakfast thing here and totally weird to me. So yes, after a nice morning breakfast and movie it was time to head back to campus because steph had to be home for work at 6.


Chilling at GR
Friday, October 1st 4:00pm - Sunday, October 3rd 8:30pm





(Yes, I am wearing both rayban's, safety goggles, and a lab coat)
After getting back from awesome times at Airlie Beach I had no desire to go back to Uni hall where i no longer have any friends, so I just decided to run back to my room really quick to pick up some more clean clothes and then crash on Lisa and Alek's couch for the next two days. It turned out to be a really great decision and we had a lot of fun just bumming around. Friday night we watched a movie that I could barely stay awake for and I ended up falling asleep around 11pm. I was so exhausted. The next morning I woke up late and we all went to breakfast together. That day we walked down to the river to play in the water (but i kept my head dry because my ears were still bothering me) and sunbathe a little bit. It was a really chill afternoon and that night we ended up playing with makeup and having a dance party. We all looked completely ridiculous, so of course, Aaron had to walk in and ask what the hell we were doing. As if one boy walking in wasn't bad enough, Jesh decided to come in too. He was holding a cup that was covered and told Alek's he had a surprise for her. It turned out to be a spider that was 3inches in diameter and it hopped right out of the cup into the tiny cramped bathroom that we were standing in. Well, Aleks is deahtly afraid of spiders, so she ran into the shower and was pressed up against the wall shaking and almost in tears. It was a little bit hilarious. Jesh had issues catching the spider, but eventually got it out and left. Poor Aleks. We quit makeup soon after and decided to watch a movie. The girls wanted to watch p.s. I love you, so we watched that. I ended up crying like a baby and of course, Aaron decided to walk in again. I got made fun of a lot and they laughed at me so much that nobody else ended up crying. I felt a little bit silly, but it was a really sad movie...yeah. After that Aleks went to bed and I decided that I needed a pick-me-up after that sad movie. Lisa and I decided to watch Jennifer's Body, the horrible movie with Megan Fox about a girl who gets possessed by a botched satanic ritual and then goes around eating men. Oh, not to mention there's a lesbian make out scene. Overall it was quite the classy film. It was so horrendously bad that lisa and I ended up laughing. I kind of want that two hours of my life back, but oh well. It was then bedtime soon after. Sunday we went down to the river again because i had to take some pictures for my photography class because I had a presentation today (monday). After that lisa and I hit up the mall because I needed some laundry detergent and other items and then before I knew it it was dinner time and then time to go back finally to stupid Uni hall.

So once again, I'm back at Uni hall in my crappy room. But at least I had a really great break! And in even more exciting news, Daniel is going to be driving up to hang out this coming weekend, so I'm pretty stoked for that!

Weekend in Proserpine

This whole past week was horribly stressful and at times this giant paper I had due at 5pm on friday had put me to tears. Well, my friend Jeppo was headed home to Proserpine for the weekend because she just needed to get away from Uni life and take a break. I also shared this need, so she said i was more than welcome to tag along. I finished my paper at like 3am friday morning, packed, and then went to bed around 4am so that I could wake up at 7:30 so that i'd have time to turn in a hardcopy, pick up a few things, and have breakfast before jeppo came to get me at 9. We rolled into prossy around 1pm and hit up the grocery to get some food because her parents had been/were still on holiday in New Zealand. We got some tim tams because they were on sale, some things for stir-fry, and a rotisserie style chicken that was delish! After we got home and unloaded the car, we set out the mattresses in front of the tv and turned on Step Brothers and then proceeded to have nap time until we had to get up and get ready for dinner at her nonna's house. We went to nonna's a little after 6 and she made us steak, salad, and gnocchi and man was dinner delicious! Plus Jeppo's nonna was just absolutely adorable. Jeppo's auntie was also at dinner with us and she was really sweet as well. Dinner was great and because Jeppo's nonna is the best she had dessert ready too. We had raspberry jelly (jello) with fresh mangoes and ice cream. A little different from what I'm used to, but still good. Having homemade food again was really nice, although, I'm sure my mom's cooking could get nonna's a run for her money. After dinner it was time to hit up the local establishments because jeppo's very attractive male cousin was going into town. Now, proserpine is a tiny town and basically it has one pub, and a few nights a month they open up the upstairs which is called "club met". I wasn't in the mood for going out and neither was jeppo, but we went because her cousin was keen. Going out was definitely a little awkward. Plus the fact that i was the only one who didn't know everyone else in the bar added to the discomfort. On the bright side, jeppo's cousin is one of the most obnoxious and hilarious drunks, so at least that provided some quality entertainment. After 2 somewhat excruciating hours of being semi introduced to people who didn't want to talk to me in a room that was entirely too loud, jeppo and i left to go back home and get some work done. 30 minutes later we went back to pick up her epically drunk cousin who was going to stay the night because he was in no right state to drive home. Well, that night was interesting to say the least because about 30 minutes after I had gone to bed owen (jeppo's cousin) tried to join me. Needless to say I told him to GTFO and when he tried to share the bed with me i left to go sleep on the couch. He felt bad about that, so luckily he went back to the family room and i got the bed to myself. Like i said, that night was filled with awkwardness. It was kind of funny though. Saturday morning owen left and katrina and i ended up getting very little homework done and taking more naps and watching more movies. She had to go to the doctor that day too because she hadn't been feeling well. Turns out she has a throat and respiratory infection as well as having her glandular fever flare back up. poor thing. so yes, lots more relaxing and resting, something that we both needed. Later that night we went to a rodeo to watch her cousin owen bull ride. It was SOOO much fun but made me really anxious. Owen got slammed up into the fencing of the ring by the bull and then thrown off and stepped on, but at least he qualified and was basically okay. There were a lot of other people getting beaten up by these bulls too. I don't think i've ever seen such angry animals before. But yes, jeppo and i just enjoyed from the bleachers and i dont think there could have been two people more out of place. we were both dressed in cute tops with flats. I at least had a pair of jeans on, but jeppo was wearing leggings. Everyone else was in jeans, boots, and plaid flanel. That was one of the funniest parts of the night. That and all of the odd country music they were playing. One song's chorus included the line "i want to check you for ticks". weird. And of course, they played Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy. We ended up leaving soon after Owen had ridden and we went to go see if he was okay. I think we got home around 8:30, at which point I got to call Daniel, my friend steph's brother who is the biggest sweety in the world to see if he wanted to come and hang out! Plus he is majorly cute, so that was a perk also. So yeah, daniel came over and we watched Anchorman, which is stupid but hilarious and we had some good chats. During the movie Katrina couldn't find her keys, so we interrupted watching to find them. Turns out she had accidentally locked them in her car and there were no spares, so she called her neighbor to help her break into the car. Luckily her neighbor seemed to be a straight up professional and the keys were retrieved successfully with no damage to her vehicle. Anyways, after that little fiasco it was pretty late and Daniel ended up staying the night. Thankfully he is not a super huge skeeze-bag like katrina's drunken cousin was and I didn't have to worry about late night intruders. It was really nice to hang out with daniel because he doesn't go to the university with us, hes busy having a real job and being a successful business owner at the age of 21. But yes, he is a really great guy. Sunday morning Jeppo and I were supposed to head back to her nonna's house before heading back to uni so that she could feed us a good lunch but there was a major wrench thrown into the plans in the form of a second car dilemma. Daniel went to go leave and his car wouldn't start and then we couldn't get it to go with jumper cables. Katrina ended up going to her nonna's while i stayed at her house with daniel to try to figure business out, but unfortunately it wouldn't go. on the way out we dropped him at red rooster so he could get some lunch, but we had to turn around after and come back because we had realized we had forgotten katrinas doctors note to excuse her from late penalties on assignments because of her health. Driving past we saw daniel walking back to katrina's with his lunch so he could wait there with his car, so we snagged him and gave him another ride back while we went for her note. By the time we left he still hadn't been picked up, and i dont know how long he had to wait before his dad could come and snag him. Definitely too many car issues this weekend. But yes, now I'm back safe in townsville after having a really nice weekend to unwind.

Casino Night! good, but not so good.

Last night a bunch of girls and I decided to hit up the Casino In Townsville and then meet up with a bunch of our pharmacy friends at the club Consortium, where their after Pharmacy Ball party was going to be happening. Turns out last night is the night I learned how much I hate casinos. Laura and I played blackjack, and the stupid thing is that you've got a $15 minimum bet. Well, we both played 3 hands and lost, and that was the end of my gambling. It wasn't even like vegas with free booze for gamblers or anything like that and if you want a drink they can't serve you at the tables, you have to get up and go to the bar to get it yourself. LAME. So yes, i lost $45 in less than 10 minutes. I had planned on winning $3000, but obviously lady luck was not on my side last night. After the casino we made the long walk back to consortium to hang with everybody. They were being VIPs upstairs, an area we weren't allowed in, so 3 of us decided to hit up Flynn's, the irish pub, to get cheaper drinks. Well, let me tell you it was PACKED in there and a lot of fun. Our night started off with this crazy guy named Lee coming up to us and flashing his wedding ring and asking if we were married. Obviously we all said no, but we asked him why he was advertising being married when it seemed like he was trying to pick up. Hilarious. Turns out hes married to an american from Georgia, and he kept talking about how australian men are lazy and they suck and they are really intimidated by how strong and vocal american women are. He then proceeded to tell us that if we wanted free drinks, all we had to do was go up to an aussie and say "Oi, by me a god damn drink". Of course, we tried our luck at this and ended up with some pretty good success! I didn't have to pay for any drinks while there!! Lee taught us how to play coins, its very similar to what we call quarters in the US, and then we had a good long chat about all sorts of things, including solar panels. Meanwhile, there was this creepy drunk fat man dancing with his corona in the background. I think I almost peed my pants laughing at his dancing, it was great. We got some other random guy to buy us a round of drinks and took a photo with him, and then eventually this younger guy sat down with us. He looked at me and immediate told me that I went to uni, lived at university hall, and specifically in the townhouses. I was a little weirded out that he knew all of this information, but he admitted that he saw me a lot during meals and lives on the second floor of the main building. So yes, less creepy. Should I be flattered? I'm not sure. But anyways, he turned out to be a nice guy and not creepy for the rest of the conversation, his name was Levi. After sufficient free drinks, we left and headed back to consortium for some dancing. This time we lied to the people at the front and said we were with pharmacy ball, so they gave us wristbands to get upstairs. HUZZAH! Eventually something or other happened and I guess I got upset and I left to go to the bus stop and have a nice long cry. While taking said good cry, a crazy aboriginal woman and two girls from uni came up to check if i was okay. I was okay, but just crying a lot. The aboriginal woman put her arm around me and told me all sorts of encouragement, and i think she was mildly inebriated. She yelled a lot of weird things too, but a lot of it had to do with aboriginal men having more than one wife and telling me that i shouldn't let boys bother me and that there was nothing wrong with me. Overall, andrea was quite nice, even if she seemed a bit crazy. Everybody soon showed up at the bus stop, but i didn't want to have anything to do with them, so i kept talking to the two chicks from uni who were also very sweet. i sat next to one of them on the bus and she provided some more emotional support now that i no longer had Andrea. LOL. During the busride I found that I REALLY had to pee, and by the time we got to our bus stop so i could go to my room i REALLY REALLY was about to explode. I booked it off the bus, because I had to pee so bad, I walked up the stairs, got to the outside door, put my key into the lock and....the door wont open. I tried frantically to open it but it just would not work. Turns out that sometime during the night my key somehow got demagnetized. Awesome. I was about to piss myself, but luckily Theresa let me in so I didn't have to pee in the bushes. I was hoping the key would still work on my room door, but of course, it didn't work there either. Somebody had to call an RA at 3am so that they could open my room. it sucked. So yes, that was my big friday night, parts could have been better, but i definitely enjoyed the little bit we spend at Flynn's.

Update on the keys: I went to shower this morning and accidentally closed the door so i was standing in the hall in my towel again. I had to ask my neighbor to call an RA for me because I couldn't get to my phone. obviously. I had to keep my door propped open all day until just around 2pm when the head of hall finally came in to give me a spare. Shit took forever, but at least I have some spare keys now and don't have to leave my door open so I don't get locked out.

Big Australian Adventure: Sunday

Sunday morning was another early morning. We went ziplining through the rainforest before being picked up for the ride back down to cairns at 1. let me tell you, zip lining is possibly one of the coolest things EVER. The guides for that were awesome and really funny, and they all gave us helmets (which had names on them) that they thought would go well/not go well with everybody's looks and personality. I got stuck with Hannah Montana. awesome. Anyways, we had to hike up some big hills and my calves were killing me, but it was well worth it. Some of the stations they had us go in pairs, and others we got to go solo. The best one was a zip line right over this river. They stopped us in the middle of that one and it was so great. It sort of feels like flying :) I took two of the zip lines upside down because I am baller and there are pictures, and even a video, to prove it! Zip lining definitely was way too short. I could've stayed up there all day long, even though it was raining a little bit. I will definitely be going again some day!! After zip lining we had a little bit of time to kill so lisa and I got some ice cream (overpriced, of course) and sat with caitlin while she ate a salad before heading down to the beach for a few last photos and another relaxing beach walk. The bus ride home wasn't nearly as exciting as the one on the way up. People were more tired, if that was possible, and we had a way less awesome bus driver who wasn't as energetic as Roddy. We stopped at three places on the ride back. The first was called Alexandria lookout. You were supposed to be able to overlook the rainforest and where the daintree river emptied into the ocean, but it was a pretty cloudy day so nobody got out to take pictures and we just sort of drove passed. If it was a clear day, it would have been breathtaking, but it was still pretty to see. The second was this big place called Mossman Gorge where we were supposed to be allowed to go swimming. Unfortunately, they said it had rained too much in the previous days and that the current was too fast, so we couldn't get in. But we were able to walk along the paths surrounding it and go up to the suspension bridge overlooking the river. Now, this would have been fine, except there were loads of other people swimming in the gorge. I was a little bit upset, but I guess its an insurance/safety thing because we were technically with a tour and they didn't want anybody going in and not coming back out. oh well. This place was also beautiful, sorry if you're tiring of hearing that, but Australia has A LOT of really beautiful things to see. Our final stop was a town along the way called Port Douglas. It is one of those places where the rich and famous go to play. We only had 30 minutes or so to walk around and check things out. There was this really cool hippie type shop, but everything was ungodly expensive so I didn't buy anything there. Instead, we walked down the street a little ways to get some gelato! After that it was a boring, rainy drive back to cairns. we didn't have anywhere to stay or put our stuff because our bus back was leaving at midnight, so we just kind of kicked in around town. the girls and I hit up a restroom to put on more acceptable clothes, fix up our hair, and throw on some perfume (because none of us had showered). After that we went to dinner and i checked out the night markets for some gifts. I got some nice earrings for my big sis, hopefully she likes them. If not, i have no problem with keeping them because I like them A LOT. Aleks bought some soap in hopes of showering, and then we headed over to the big community infinity pool right by the waters edge to try to find a shower. Well, turns out the man had starting cleaning the locker rooms out because it was 9pm and it was closing. Luckily he was in the middle of cleaning the mens, so he told us we had around 10 minutes. Aleks finally took her shower and the rest of us kind of just hung out while waiting. After that lovely experience, we went and sat by the water until the bus came, and that was that.

Big Australian Adventure: Saturday

Okay, day 2 our the epic adventure. Sorry this has taken so long to post. Anyways! Saturday morning we got picked up really early by a bus transporting us up to Cape tribulation. We got picked up sometime around 7:20 am and much to our lovely surprise, our bus driver/tour guide was absolutely FANTASTIC! He was this crazy, chubby guy probably in his mid to late 20s named Roddy. He had horribly scruffy facial hair, wore neon purple sunglasses, and had a lip ring. He joked around a lot as was a really cool guy and definitely made the drive up a lot of fun. On the way up we stopped at a little breakfast place for something to eat which made the BEST bacon and egg sandwiches on sesame seed buns. We eventually got to the daintree river, and at that point we got on a boat for a little crocodile tour while roddy took the van across on the ferry. We saw some epically huge crocs during this sweet little boat cruise. One of them they guessed was near 100 years old because all of his teeth had fallen out. His name was scarface and he had to club all of his prey to death with his head. After the short cruise we hopped back onto the bus and our next stop was the Daintree rainforest to take a little walk. WOW. This place was absolutely stunning. I learned a lot about all sorts of plants there, but my favorite thing was probably hearing about the mangroves. They live in really saline water, but the only way they can manage is by filtering all of the salt into one leaf called a sacrificial leaf, which then dies so the rest of the tree can live. CRAZY! Walking through the oldest rainforest in the world was definitely a surreal experience. It really was just completely awesome. I wish we would've been able to walk for more than the 45 minute we spent in there, but we had more places to go and things to see, so once again, we hopped on the bus to get dropped at our hostel. Our hostel was basically in the rainforest right at the edge of the beach. I got put in a separate room from everybody else, but it worked out okay because I got to meet some really cool people! plus, everybody else was just right next door or across the way if i needed anything. I had 4 roomies, a kid my age named michael from germany, a woman in her late 20s or early 30s from Ireland, and a really young couple from the netherlands. I got to hang out with michael a little bit, he was pretty cute and was the most stereotypical german ever. He said "yah" a lot. It was kind of silly. So yes, we took a lot of strolls along the beach, which was also so beautiful. You could see a lot of the forest covered hills and there were all of these really cool fallen/growing sideways giant trees that we took some cool pictures on. I only got in the water once, and only to my waist. It was kind of dirty with a lot of leaf litter and such, so i came out with all of this stuff stuck on my legs. So yes, a lot of time was just spent walking along the beach and chilling out. One of the coolest things about being up in the rainforest is all of the spontaneous 20-30 minute rain storms, and its great that it is a nice, warm rain. We got caught in one of these little downpours and just played around in it, skipped some rocks, and found some awesome shells. Later that night a bunch of people got really drunk and rowdy, even though this wasn't exactly a place to do that. I'm pretty sure most people go out there to connect with nature and enjoy the quiet. The people i was with weren't the LEAST bit quiet. They were wrestling out in the open porch between the rooms and yelling and screaming and I'm pretty sure one of them vomited right outside my window. I told my roomies I'd go talk to them, but they were thoroughly annihilated and beyond the point of being reasoned with. At one point Aleks started taunting me about how I was upset and she was just being really patronizing about the whole thing. So yes, eventually the Irish woman went out and told them to shut the F*** up. She said you know you're too drunk when an Irishwoman tells you to settle down. hahaha. she was great. She didn't want me to go out and talk to them because she didn't want bad blood between me and my friends. Honestly, half of those people I don't regularly hang out with so i could care less. they were being obnoxious and it was embarrassing. I think that just about covers everything, It was a pretty chill day overall.

Big Australian Adventure: Friday

So Cameron, lisa, scott, dan, grant, and myself left on the grey hound at 1am Friday morning to head up to Cairns and meet up with Aleks and Caitlin who had gone up the previous day. So yes, we got on the bus ridiculously early and none of us could sit next to one another because we were one of the last stops to pick people up at. I ended up making some woman move her crap so I could sit down because she was taking up two seats. I couldn't sleep the whole ride because it was horribly uncomfortable and there were also two older, smelly, women who were talking rather loudly that sat right behind me. One of them also kept breathing oddly, and it sounded kind of like creepy laughing mixed with labored breathing. I'm not really sure what was up with her, it was weird. There were also a few times when the woman directly behind me would put her hand on the headrest of my chair and grope my head. Once again, very weird and distracting when trying to fall asleep. We got into Cairns around 7am and had to check in at our boat in the marina at 8am for our day trip to the reef to SCUBA! Luckily for us the bus depot was a 5-10 minute walk from the marina so we took some time to find a bathroom to change and wash up before starting our day. We also went to the stops at the entrance to the marina for a little breakfast. I happened to be the smart one in the group and brought food along to limit my purchases, so i had some apples, bananas, and granola for breakfast while waiting for everybody to get their food and coffee. After all of that we had about 10 minutes to get to our boat, which happened to be in nearly the very last slip down the marina. We got there on time and hopped onto this HUGE pontoon-like mega-big sailboat. oh wait, did i mention that our trip got upgraded because the original boat we were on was down for maintenance? because it did! SCHWING! The professional photographer grabbed our picture and then we headed down to the cabin with all of our luggage and had some complimentary morning tea and biscuits! After tea we filled out some mandatory paperwork and then the boat set off for the 2 or so hour sail out to the reef. We all spent a lot of time sitting out on deck and checking out the gorgeous scenery and enjoying the sweet sunshine. Eventually they called everyone out to the deck for a explanation of the safety procedures, fire risks, where the life jackets where, and all that jazz. It ended up being really entertaining, the crew was great. At the point when they were talking about sea sickness the guy said that the instructions for the barf bags were conveniently printed right on the inside and that when you were finished to just throw the bag overboard, but to be mindful of the wind because Australia is the land of boomerangs, and what goes away has a silly tendency to come back at you. hahaha. During this talk they also mentioned that you could rent an underwater camera ( a nice one) for $50 for the entire day and they'd put all your pictures, along with some professional ones, on a CD for you. So, of course, I jumped on that opportunity. Lucky for me, everything thing else, aka gear hire and lunch, were already paid for so i was more than willing to spend the money on the camera. Although, i did have to rent a wetsuit for $8, but the lady couldn't figure out how to work the register so she just gave us them for free!! We landed off of a cay called Michaelmas Cay. Cam, grant, myself, and some girl from France were the only people on the boat that were certified divers, so we basically had a dive master all to ourselves! For our first dive we took a boat out to the beach on the Cay and started as a shore dive, so it was an easy one. We saw all sorts of awesome things, including my favorite, a sea turtle!! Our guide let us hold this huge, lumpy sea cucumber and showed us nemo hiding in a sea anemone along with heaps of other things. We also got to touch a giant clam to get it to snap shut. awesome! They really are quite beautiful, with all sorts of blues and purples along their mantle because of the symbiotic zooxanthellae that they house. The dive was nice, but visibility could have been a lot better. We kept kicking up the sand from the ocean floor. Speaking of which, i made the stupid mistake of leaving my fins at uni, so i had to borrow the not as nice ones from the boat which didnt come with booties or a heel strap. they were the lame rubbery ones that we used to use at swim practice and they were WAY too narrow for my feet. This meant that all of that sand floating around kept finding its way into my fins and chafing my poor feet, which really sucked. Anyways, after the dive it was time for lunch. They served an AMAZING spread. There was fish, garlic parmesan potatoes, rice, chicken wings, a large assortment of fresh fruits ( I tried passion fruit for the first time), a few different pasta salads, regular salad, prawns with the head and everything still attached, bread, and cold cut meat and cheese. It was so delicious and probably the best meal I've had since I've been in Australia. We all sat out in the sunshine on deck and ate and it was absolutely perfect. A little while after lunch the two boys and I suited up for our second dive. This time the french girl didn't come along because she didn't have the money to pay for a second dive, so it was just the three of us, plus another boat employee so i'd have a diving buddy. We went out to a reef called Coral Gardens that was absolutely stunning. Visibility here was better because there wasn't really sandy sediment because it was all coral everywhere. I don't think I've seen so many different beautiful coral formations in my life, it was absolutely breathtaking. I just wish the colors you see when your down there transfer better in pictures. Oh well. Anyways, we saw some more cool fish and on this one we even saw.....SHARKS! Two, to be exact. White tipped reef sharks. They were awesome and I got pretty dang close to one, I'd say within 10 feet. SO cool!!!! Even though we didn't see any turtles on this dive it was definitely my favorite. This dive didn't last that long and we had to fight the current a bit, but afterwards we hopped back into the little boat to bring us back to the main boat for the sail back. I dropped off my digicam to get my pictures put into CD format and then the lot of us went up to chill some more on the deck and take in the rays. After it got a little chilly we made our way back into the cabin where they served us complimentary champagne while one of the crew members was kickin' it on his acoustic guitar playing some jack johnson and some other sweet tunes. Talk about a perfect day. After we got back to town we headed for our hostel, Gilligan's, and checked into our room. Because there were 8 of us together we fit perfectly into one room, which was awesome. I decided to take a shower because i was feeling filthy and most everybody else decided to start smashing the booze. It was roughly 6pm. Once i got out of the shower I realized the girls had gone to buy alcohol, the guys were already boozing, and there was a random piece of coral in the sink being run under hot water. Turns out dan had ripped a large coral off of the reef and brought it back, and was now killing it via thermal stress in the sink. I was pretty irritated about that, seeing as he took it from a protected wildlife preserve. What a d-hole. but yes, after all that lisa, caitlin, and I did a little shopping before meeting up with everyone for dinner at Cactus Jack's. After dinner it was back to the room, I laid down in bed right away and was ready to sleep because I was exhausted. It wasn't even 10pm yet, and all the guys really wanted to go out. Only 2 of them ended up going and everybody kind of just went to bed. We had to be up early saturday because our bus was picking us up at 7:25am to take us up to cape tribulation.

SO TIRED

So the past few days/weeks have been pretty hectic. I've been having lab reports, papers, and photography assignments due nearly non-stop. Also, I had my first test today, a midsemester exam, for my invertebrate biology class. Needless to say I had been studying A TON for the past two days trying to cram in all of that information, because believe you me, there is sooooo much information and they want so much detail. I think the test went pretty well, actually. It was 5 short essay questions and one longer essay question. I definitely rocked 3 of the 5 short answers, one of them i had no idea about (the one question i looked at while studying and was like, ''oh, this might be on the test'' but didn't actually go over), and the other I had to semi-bullshit because I couldn't think straight, so i think that one i'll get at least partial credit. As for the longer essay, I'm pretty sure I snagged full marks.

This will be my first weekend where I don't actually have mandatory work to do that needs to be ready for monday, so i've decided to take advantage and head up to cairns with some of my buddies from GR. Unfortunately, I do have a very large research paper due next friday that i have no desire to do, but i'm trying to start it now to get it at least partially done. so far no such luck, i am tired from previous nights of studying. I know for sure it wont get done this weekend or even friday or monday, seeing as my bus leaves friday at 1am and gets back here monday at 5am. let me remind you, i have 5 hours of class straight on mondays. excellent. I will be an even more tired girl.

but anyways, I'm super excited for Cairns. We're getting in at 6am friday morning and then later in the day we've got SCUBA planned!! Cam, grant, and I are all certified and we're doing a 2 tank dive while the other kids do a beginner dive (which doesnt require cert.) and then a snorkel. Ours is only $50 more expensive, and all of our gear is included. I think it came out to $200 or $250 overall for 2 tank dive, boat charter, gear, lunch, etc. Pretty good deal! The next day we're taking a bus up to cape tribulation into the daintree rainforest and i think we're doing some tours or something and staying at this really nice rainforest cabin place. AND we're going to zipline. I am really stoked for that too!

So far that is the plan, wish me luck on the paper and I will update after what is sure to be an incredible weekend!

Battle scars

So far its been a pretty eventful past few days. I went to a classy cocktail party on saturday and had LOADS of fun. After hanging out there during the day I made it back to my dorm around 8pm because everyone was schwasted as it started at 2:30pm. I got to spend the rest of the night with some cool kids at my dorm playing some card games and some uno, which surprisingly I didn't win. Oh well. At one point I ate an entire family share pack of tim tams which was NOT a good idea. For those of you who don't know, that is 20 1.5x2.5x.5 inch very rich chocolatey cookies. Needless to say I had to remove those from my system and ended up getting hit in the face by a tree while walking through a shrubby/woodsy area to take care of things. This was how I obtained my first battle scar of the evening which appears as an inch long very red scratch right below my right eye. classy.

My second..and third and fourth battle scars came this evening at water polo. A lot of new people came this week which was really really exciting! There was even another girl who showed up that plays for the australian national team. Anyways, there is this guy from france who they call "frenchie" and he is a beast. He throws his shots so hard that I was terrified to be in goal to block his shots, thank god he hits post a lot. But anyways, I was guarding him during a drill and he jacked me in the face pretty hard. That hurt a lot. I don't think I'll get any bruising and my nose doesn't seem to be broken, but things are a little red so far. We also play this game to determine who gets ball possession for half court play. They call it underwater rugby, and as you can imagine, it is basically a free-for-all of people jumping on one another in the shallow end and trying to grab the ball which is to be moved across the pool underwater and then touched to the pool deck on the other side to score a point. I can feel a large bruise developing on one of my thighs and I have various grab marks on my forearms. This game was AWESOME. But yeah, the people at water polo are great! They are really funny and huge goofballs and I have a lot of fun when I'm there. They asked me to come and play some touch rugby this wednesday because they need some more girls to play. Should be a good time!

And for now I'm back to getting my homework done so I can go out tomorrow on cheap tuesday!

Scientific reports blow

So. I'm currently working on one of my scientific reports for my coral reef ecology class. We have to write it in a specific journal format and I have a page limit. Now, I never thought I would ever have a problem with page limits because I'm usually too concise, but now it seems like I'm cutting things out left and right. I have a 6 page limit, I'm at 4 pages and I haven't even touched my introduction or my discussion/conclusion yet. Plus now I have to sift through all of these articles to try to find evidence for what I find or explanations for disproving this and that. Either way, I have to finish this bad boy for 4pm on friday so I have tonight and tomorrow to get it together. Hence why I'm already on my 3rd cup of black tea, which apparently has more caffeine that coffee. Oh joy. It's only been 40 minutes. I think this means I will not be sleeping this evening.

On top of all that, I'm ridiculously stressed and preoccupied because I finally got that phone call about switching dorms. At this point I've already put some roots down here and I'm already completely settled in, so I have NO clue if I'm going to switch over or not. Of all the days to get that phone call, why today? And why did it have to come in the middle of my nap this morning?

Other than those little fiascoes, things are still going well. I got my first practical write up back for my invertebrate biology class and I was happy with the result based on how unclear the directions I had to go off of were. I ended up with a D, which is just below HD, their highest mark. It stands for High Distinction and Distinction. Basically what it means is that i got an 80% and all I need is another 5% points to get an HD. Once again, I'm happy with it seeing as I had really no idea what I was doing or what to expect and I'm positive I will master the two that are due next week.

I don't think I'll be making it to water polo this evening. I really want to churn out as much of this report as possible. And besides, I think they are doing some crazy swim set tonight that I really don't want to take part in. Last time I almost threw up dinner and that was just doing water polo style IM's with an underwater length between each stroke.

Okay! That is enough distraction from this report so I'm going to get back to it. Hopefully I will have another section done by dinner time in an hour :)

Couples Night Out!

So last night was couples night and it was a huuuuge blast. Lisa and i went as peter pan and tinkerbell and spent a long time early friday hunting for items to make our outfits. I bought some lime green fabric and ended up sewing a dress type garment together to wear out and I found some purple children's fairy wings for $10 at the fabric store. We looked really classy and had a ton of fun! At 8 we all got on a big charter bus outside of the dorm that took us to the bar where we had the whole top floor booked for our private party from 8-11pm. During that time we had 2 free kegs and $2.50 basics until the floor opened up to the public again at 11. A lot of people were really REALLY plastered and for a little while i was in the bathroom making sure one girl didn't fall asleep and was getting some water into her. I tried to set an alarm on her cell but those damn blackberry phones are much too sophisticated for me to handle. Anyways, I did some quality dancing with a lot of people and at one point Scotty asked me if I had ever been dipped before. I told him Dan dipped me all the time because hes a really fun/good dancer, but Scotty wanted to prove his skilled so he dragged me out to the dance floor. Unfortunately, Scotty was really piss drunk and dipped me, hit my head on the floor, dropped me, and then proceeded to fall on top of me while my knee was raised. I'm surprised that I somehow didn't hit him in his pertinent parts. Luckily I recovered just fine and got back up and just hoped everyone was too drunk to notice the fact that my dress had come up upon falling and that everyone could see my underwear. Note to self, you never know when you're going to get dropped, so don't wear non-pants out. I think the only other unfortunate thing is that one kid from GR tried to get a little too friendly with me while dancing. I told him if he tried to put his hands anywhere near my skirt again that I'd kill him. He stopped. Problem solved! Just because people are drunk doesn't give them excuses to be creepy. But yes, the rest of the night was great and I did lots of singing and dancing with the girls. I was going to stay at GR last night, but we took the public bus home instead of the charter bus and just decided to get off at my dorm's stop so i could sleep in my own bed instead of on lisa's floor. I guess right after I had gotten off the bus some very large man of some sort of asian decent walked up and kissed Matt Dawes (one of the guys on the bus from GR) right on the mouth for a good few seconds and then walked off completely straight faced. I'm really sad that I had missed that.

Today there was a big 50% off sale at Stockies, the big mall near school. The girls and I went and did a little shopping and i got a nice 3/4 sleeve black dress with crazy back cutouts for going out in. The weird part is that it is knit, but still fairly cute, I think. So yes, it is now 7:30pm and I am ready for a rest.

Couples Night

Hey all, so this friday is couples night over at George Roberts Hall and what that means is it is basically a HUGE party at the college and everybody goes in pairs and dresses up as things that go together. I'm going with lisa and we were thinking maybe peter pan and wendy or peter pan and tinkerbell? It can be anything that goes together really, like salt and pepper, x's and o's, you catch my drift. Does anybody have any ideas? Please remember, after we start the party at the college we will be moving into town dressed as whatever we are so I don't want to be dressed in something that requires me to be in a box or large bulky costume that will prevent me from shaking my groove thang. So yes, PLEASE send some ideas my way!

Water Polo!

Today started off pretty hard. I stayed up really late talking to my neighbor last night (until 2am) and then I had to wake up at 8 this morning to get ready for class at 9. Class ended at 10 and I proceeded to take an hour long nap until I had to leave for my practical at 11:30. Prac ended at 1 instead of 12:50 so I was a little late getting to part two of my invertebrate biology class and ALMOST considered not going because I was so dang tired and those lectures are so boring, but I was a good student and I went.

Anywho, after class I got my water polo things and headed back to GR with lisa to do a little bit of reading and maybe just bum around until dinner at 5:45 and water polo at 6:30. Well, I managed to soldier through one of my articles for coral reef ecology that I had to read for this week and then around 3:30pm I fell asleep in lisa's bed for a good two hours. Really, I've been quite exhausted. We ended up going to dinner together and I was questioning water polo because it was a cold day here and the sun sets around 6, but I decided I was excited to go anyways and put on my swim suit and headed over to the pool. It seems that a lot of people were discouraged by the cold because there was a grand total of 6 of us, 5 guys and myself. It was all good though, My RA (the guy who talks to me about polo) was there and he told me who everybody was and we just ran some drills and then played 5-alive because there wasn't really much we could do with so few of us. their version of 5-alive is kind of cool, when you're shooting against somebody with 1 life left you have to backhand it and if you get someone out you don't go in, the person after you does, because otherwise you are getting punished for making a goal. I really liked that rule. They started off saying that they were going to shoot lefty against me because I was a girl, but I insisted they not hold back because that would just be crap. One of the guys agreed and mentioned that I could shoot, so really, there was no need to go easy on me. I ended up being the first one out but managed to save one goal with my face. BALLER. After 5-alive we just did some shooting and I think all of my shots went in. The really good guy (who also happens to be really ridiculously good looking) complemented me on my skillz. We were only in the pool for roughly an hour, but it was nice to just mess around with the guys in the pool. I am super excited about polo every monday and wednesday now and think its funny that I will most likely be the only girl playing.

I actually have to do work now

So I'm now into week 3 of school and I actually have to start getting serious. My coral reef ecology class makes me exhausted after every lecture. I am being packed with so much information in that class it is crazy. I'm talking roughly 3 pages front and back of notes in a 50 minute class period. Fortunately, it is all new stuff and all we really have to do is a few readings and some lab reports which seem to be really quite manageable.

My invertebrate biology class is still kicking my butt. Lab is pretty boring, mainly because I can't focus my eyes properly in the microscope and drawing diagrams of animal tissues isn't exactly my idea of a good time. I had to turn in my first Practical (lab) report this past monday at noon, so hopefully I did everything that they asked for properly. I should be getting the grades back soon enough and will know then.

Photography class is still great! I have a lot of brainstorming left to do for my first project which is due the 27th. I also need to by a flashdrive because I have no idea where mine went...But yes! Raul is great and I have to start brainstorming pairs of opposites.

My biodiversity class is just weird. I don't really have much to do for it, but that is okay, i guess. We went on a fieldtrip this weekend to Rowe's bay to look at the biodiversity gradient of organisms along the coast while the tides were low. We saw a bunch of crabs, snails, and even a few brittle stars (these crazy star fish). My group members and I decided we didn't want to do the write up for this field trip, so we stopped taking notes and just proceeded to poke around at things and try to pick up the overly aggressive crabs. Another highlight of the trip was poking and moving the sea cucumbers..hehehe. For those of you who don't know, irritating them causes them to shoot out these while sticky tubules that look rather....silly. It didn't help that one of the professors along told us that they shoot their sticky stuff into the faces of fish to try to get them to go away. Hilarious.

Today I played hooky from biodiversity because i just couldn't stand staying awake from the 5 to 6 slot, but no worries, my lecturer basically reads directly from the slides which are all posted online. Also, it has been raining all day today! It was just lightly raining after dinner so Pranav and I went for a walk and had a little chat and currently I'm sitting in my room with my balcony door open and it is raining quite hard. It is really quite lovely, but it has forced a large dragonfly into my room which will definitely need to leave before I go to sleep later. I wish I could go for a run, but I feel like alone in the dark at 9pm isn't the safest time to go...oh well. In other news, I missed water polo on monday but saw Nick today (the guy in charge) and he cleared up times, so I will be getting in tomorrow for a little water polo action. I am definitely excited for that!

so yes, not much really going on now that class has started. It is cheap tuesday, but I'm inside doing work instead of going out because I am being a responsible student!

Crazy Drunks

Last night I was all snuggled up and sleeping in my bed when suddenly I was woken up by rather loud banging on my door around 4am. At first I thought it was a mistake, but then somebody started calling "BAILEY". I hoped they would just leave, but the banging went on for a good 10 minutes. Turns out it was those norwegian guys that helped me with my internet that were temporarily housed here before O-week and school started. At first it was "BAILEY, open the door, it's Jonas!" After a few minutes of him yelling at me to open the door and me telling him to go away, he started saying that Henrich was there too. Finally I got up and opened my front door, only to realize that nobody was there. They had managed to climb up to my second floor balcony and were banging on my balcony door. I was started to get freaked out and they were yelling at me again to open the door because it was "time for the after party". Needless to say, I eloquently told them to get off of my balcony, that they had woken me up, and that I was absolutely not going open the door and was going back to bed.

I guess this is what happens when the on campus bar right across the street from my building, Uni Club, starts participating in cheap Tuesday so they get more business. If Cheap Tuesday at Uni club means having to listen to the music blaring until 3am and having crazed, muscular drunk foreign men banging on my balcony door then I hope they stop doing it and leave cheap tuesday to the bars downtown.

Airlie Beach

This past weekend was loads of fun. Jeppo and Steph drove us down to Proserpine/Airlie Beach, which is where they are from. It was a 3 hour drive and just really nice to relax and see what another part of this country is like. We left around noon on saturday and when we arrived at Jeppo's house her mom had homemade quiche and a spaghetti-like dish hot and waiting for us. Let me just say homecooked food is GREAT and it was definitely quite a treat. Her mom's quiche was fantastic and the crust was perfectly light and flaky...yum! Anyways, all of us ended up taking a huge nap after eating because we were all pretty tired from the op-shop (goodwill ugly clothing) party on campus the night before.

After our 3-ish hour long nap we chatted a little bit and steph and her brother came over and we then headed off to Cactus Jack's in Airlie Beach for dinner at 8pm. I was a little bit skeptical about having mexican food in australia but the fajitas I got were phenomenal! They put some weird sort of bbq like sauce on them, but regardless, delish! We were all pretty tired and didn't plan on really going out afterward, but decided we had to at least walk around a little bit and check a few things out as long as we were there. We went to a club called Evolutions which was basically deserted because it was only 10. We did a lot of sitting on the couches there, but after awhile of course I had to debut some of my sweet gucinski dance moves. After Evolutions we moved to Mama Africa's and thats when I peed and discovered they have animal print toilet seats there! Unfortunately for Mama Africa's, we left soon after arriving and went back to Jeppo's. We moved a bunch of mattresses into the garage and basically all sleep in a big mosh of people.

Sunday morning Jeppo's mom made really tasty toast, tea, and berry and chocolate pancakes. After a very long and tasty breakfast we headed back to Airlie beach to hang out at the lagoon. The lagoon is basically a GIANT multi-sectioned pool right on the shore overlooking the harbor that anybody can swim in (for free) because jellyfish are such a problem in the actual ocean. We had a beautiful view of all of the boats and did a little bit of swimming and a little bit of tanning. It was definitely a low key day but It probably couldn't have been more perfect. Stephs mom came down with sausages so we could have a sausage sizzle on one of the public grills that are all over place. I had 3 sausages because they were so tasty and proceeded to walk around with the most giant food baby in my swim suit. It was definitely an excellent weekend!! We didn't do a lot of partying, but I was definitely okay with that. I think next time we go we are going to hit up a few of the whitsunday islands.

Monday and today were pretty uneventful, althought I did have a great conversation with my photography professor. I found out that hes from colombia and we spoke a little bit of spanish. He told me that I had a really good accent and that said that I should write all of my artist statements for my folios in spanish so I could practice. He also said from now on he will only speak to me in class in spanish so i can get more practice, so we'll see how that goes. Long story short, Raul is awesome.

Today was laundry day. There is something really gratifying about sun drying laundry on my balcony. I sat in my room and listened to a little bit of Jack Johnson and just really enjoyed the sunshine and the smell of clean laundry!! Tomorrow I will have to drag my dark load over to the main building so that I can dry my jeans so they re-shrink. Other than that, I got a lot more excellent information from my coral reef ecology class. Every time I go there I feel like my brain is going to explode from all of the new stuff, but it really is great because for the most part it is all stuff I haven't heard before. Right now I'm finishing up some handwashing, despite it being cheap tuesday. I'm playing it low key this week and not going out. I've been fairly congested and Lisa and Aleks are both really sick right now, so I'm trying to rest up and stay healthy so I don't end up like them, especially because I'm generally around them all the time.

Long week

So far it has been a long week, but all of my lecturers are great and have a really nice sense of humor. My marine invertebrate biology class seems like it is going to be a pain though. Our professor says we need "graduate skills" so part of our homework will be doing things like applying for a job, turning in a resume, and learning how to make a poster. I think this is a load of bull and she should stick to teaching the material, but no. We also have to write an essay per week and turn in in depth essay outlines every Thursday at practical. The reason I do science is because I don't like writing papers and lab write ups are totally different. This whole things is a bit silly. Speaking of the lecture for that class, today we had to attend practical and have a woman speak to us about writing essays. She basically reminded me of a modern day Delores Umbridge (for all of you harry potter fans) and spoke to us like we were incompetent 6th graders. She gave us an essay example that said to discuss annelid feeding mechanisms and then asked how we would tackle it. We said we'd research annelid feeding mechanisms and she told us that was wrong. whatever, crazy woman. This lasted for 2 hours and I really just wanted to shoot myself. We did, however, get handouts that defined important words you could find in essay questions like "discuss, analyze, compare, contrast, investigate". Because honestly, I had no idea what those words meant before this.

Other than that disaster, today was a pretty good one. Before class at 3 I walked over to GR and had lunch with everybody over there and then decided to hit up the pool to swim a little. My current RA is involved in water polo here and the "lifeguard" there on mondays and thursdays so he hooked me up with a water polo ball to swim around with. After about 40 minutes I was getting ready to leave to clean up for class, but he offered to get in and pass with me so we chatted a little and threw. It was really nice and I was excited that he was shamelessly rocking a speedo because so many people hate on speedos these days.

After class I walked back to GR with lisa and had dinner there and then we did tonight's orientation activity. They chartered a bus to drive us to an ice skating rink that they had privately booked for an hour and a half. It was a ton of fun and it was nice that I actually knew what I was doing. All of the americans were pretty competent in the ice skating department and I only fell down when I was attempting to be like nancy kerrigan. Surprisingly a lot of the australians were doing well too, but they were all FREEZING and bundled up while we were at the rink. We got home from that around 9pm and then Lisa and I went to Dave-o's room and watched super troopers instead of going out again to the Tav. All in all it was a good night. I got to share a ridiculous movie with lisa and David because they had never seen it, but david was so exhausted he fell asleep part of the way through.

Tomorrow is friday and I only have class from 10-10:50 and then a few of us are off to the op-shop (the equivalent of our thrift stores) to get ridiculous outfits for the O-week op-shop party. I still have yet to hear about the room switch, nothing has opened up yet so I guess that means they haven't kicked the kid out of his room. The head of hall over at GR emailed me back today and ended it with "i look forward to having you as a resident" so hopefully that is a good sign!

First Day of Class

Today was my first official day of school here at JCU. I stayed up late to talk to the parents and then slept in because my first class today was at 1pm. I was woken up by housekeeping and answered the door half asleep, but managed to ask her if there was something that could be done about the horrific smell in my room. She proceeded to talk about how horrible the guy was that lived here before me and when i mentioned it smelled like he smoked in here it didn't surprise her. She told me to get some rest and that she would come back next monday (even though they only clean twice a month every other monday) to try giving my room an extra thorough cleaning. After that little encounter I got up and showered and ate lunch by myself. That kinda sucked, but I saw the water polo guy there and he said he'd open the pool up today from 1 to 6 and that he'd put some balls in so we could throw around and whatnot. I told him i'd be there around 5 only realizing after our conversation that I have class from 5 to 6. Oh well, I might go there now because my photography lecture and practical finished REALLY early today because it was the first day.

Speaking of photography, I already love that class. My professor is this tall skinny guy with a long face and a very prominent beak nose. He has very VERY curly chin length ringlets, but it is cut so that the sides of his head are buzzed and it is longer at the top. Based on his accent he is DEFINITELY a spanish speaker and I'm pretty sure hes from venezuela. Anywho, Raul seems like he is going to be a really cool professor and he spent a good portion of class cracking jokes. So far so good, I have coral reef ecology and Biodiversity of Tropical australia later today and hopefully they will be just as excellent as photography was.

I still haven't heard from the other dorm seeing if I can transfer yet, but hopefully I will get word soon. Once again, keep those fingers crossed!

Saturday Races

Saturday was the day that everybody dressed up and went out to the races for the day. By races I mean horse races. The girls and I didn't go because it was expensive, but we still dressed up and went out downtown to the bars at night with everyone else as is customary to do after a day of getting drunk at the races. Out was fun and we didn't get back until 3 am. Jeppo hooked us up with some free drinks at Mad Cow because she knows the managers and we danced all night. They placed spice girls AND the macarena, talk about a good night!Unfortunately,Cameron got kicked out of the bar before we had really started the evening. He found a leopard print pimp hat and jacket on a table and decided to put them on. He put them back before the bouncers got to him, but they gave him a speech about how they don't tolerate thieves in their bar and kicked him out. Le major bummer. We still managed to have a pretty quality night thought. The bus ride home was ridiculous and lisa gave up her seat to a guy who looked like he was going to pass out. I spent the entire bus ride with him encroaching seriously on my personal space. I think that about covers saturday night. Just the usual out to the bars and dancing, nothing too special.

In other news, I emailed the woman in charge of housing at George Roberts hall to see if there was a room open there for me. I'm there all the time because that's where all of my buddies live and i spent the weekend sleeping on the girls' couch cushions because the 10 minute walk back to my dorm isn't exactly safe at night and the boys strongly warned me against doing it. Basically it just makes sense for me to move there. I'm pretty sure it's too late for me to move there because it is a little late now and I think all the rooms are full, but who knows? Doesn't hurt to ask, right? It will be a little more expensive but at least I will be near my buddies and I won't have to sleep on a floor or walk back late at night by myself. Please keep your fingers crossed for me! Hopefully I will know by tomorrow.

As for right now, I'm tempted to go for a run or a swim. It looked like it was going to rain and started sprinkling on my way home, but for now its just cloudy and a little cooler.

Wednesday, Thursday, Friday

Wednesday night was pretty low key. I spent some time with the girls and we went to the mall to do a little bit of shopping. Afterward, we played a little bit of dress up in Jeppo's room looking for dresses to wear for Saturday night because everyone dresses up to go to the races and then into town after. Later that night, Lex walked a bunch of us out into some of the brush behind the dorms where he has an area cleared with for bonfires. We sat around talking a lot and somehow happened on the topic of scary movies. I was getting quite anxious because we were sitting in the dark in the middle of random brush and Lex didn't help the matter because he thought it was hilarious to throw rocks behind me to make me jump. All of the conversations about scary movies prompted us to actually watch one, so the guys peed out the fire and we went back to davo's room to watch a scary movie called Wolf Creek. It didn't help that it is about people traveling across Australia who get picked up and killed by this crazy man living in the middle of nowhere. Great.

Thursday was another low key day. Today we actually got our first chance to go down to the river where the row club has a rope swing as well as a pontoon/dock area where they launch the boats where people go to swim. A whole group of us went and once again it was super fun. The water was a lot warmer than the ocean and i splashed around a little bit with somebody's soccer ball. I also managed the courage to try the rope swing out. You have to climb up this big tree that angles over the water and then shimmy to the very end and grab the rope that dangles at the very end. Once you grab the rope, you crawl back until it is taught and then let yourself fall to the side. SOOOOO MUUUUCH FUNN!! The only downside is that the dirt you walk through after you get of the water makes your feet dry and makes it harder to grip the tree with them. Also, the water level is way down since they’ve been repairing a dam further up the river so the drop is a little bit higher than usual. I had a few problems with my bikini becoming misplaced after dropping into the water, but luckily the water is murky enough that I didn’t have to worry about anybody creeping. I think the river is one of my new favorite places and definitely will be looking forward to going back again and again. After we were done at the river a bunch of us went to the tavern to hang out Thursday night. A few people got pretty schwasted and I got teased for just sticking to water, but it was still a fun night. I was rolling around in Davo’s wheelchair and having an overall good time. We left the Tav and got back to the GR dorm’s around midnight. I had to help Lisa out because she had a little too much to drink, but I was being a good friend and made sure she was tucked into bed and had a garbage can and water in case she needed it. Somebody was supposed to walk me home after that because I didn’t want to sleep on the floor here, but I managed by myself. It was definitely a little spooky and I don’t think I will do it again, just to be safe.

Today was another great day of many great days. The international students had the opportunity to get shuttled to Billabong Sanctuary to check out all of these cool animals. Of course, the oregonians and I thought we should take up this opportunity despite it costing $50. This place was absolutely beautiful and I shelled out the $25 to have my picture taken with both a wombat and a Koala. It might have been a lot, but they are kind of hilarious and at least the money is going towards a good cause. Before pictures they let the wombat run around a little bit and they look so funny when they run. This little guy ran straight up to Lisa’s and my ankles and started nibbling on them. We also had the opportunity to get pictures with an Olive Python and a baby salt water croc, but those were free, so of course we all took advantage of that and got ridiculous pictures of one another modeling them like high fashion accessories. One of the coolest things about this place is that you could go into a fair number of the animal cages and interact with the animals. There was a pen with these tiny red kangaroo-looking creatures that you could just walk into and play with, just as long as you didn’t pick them up. I can’t remember what they were called, but I will post pictures later. There were also a few with a mimicked rainforest area with water features inside that house a few different kinds of birds including the laughing kookaburra. There were also grey kangaroos hopping around all over the place (or maybe they were wallabies) and you could buy animal feed for 80c to feed them with. A lot of them seemed to be females because you would see little baby joeys just running up and head diving into their mothers pouches. All of a sudden you would just seed a kangaroo that looked like it had a large tumor growing out of its belly and then feet sticking out at an awkward angle. This was highly amusing. Before they fed us they also gave us a behind the scenes Crocodile show where the keeper gave us really good facts about them and baited it with a chicken drumstick. He talked about how a lot of what you hear about them is myth, and that most people who die from them are complete idiots who don’t acknowledge posted warning signs around areas where rivers meet the ocean. Ever since they have been protected in Australia (since the 60s or 70s) there have been less than one death per year by crocodile, whereas 3 Australians per year die from jiggling a vending machine and having it fall on them. I don’t ever have a need to go back to Billabong Sanctuary, but It would definitely be a really cool place to work and it was both a fun and educational trip. Right now I’m chilling in Lisa’s room and I brought my stuff so that I can just stay here for the evening instead of having to walk back again tonight. I might take a nap and then later everybody is feeling like keeping things low key with a movie night. People were suggesting things like anchorman and zoolander until I said we should watch super troopers, so now we are watching super troopers because lex and I seem to have both decided that there are too many people here that have not seen it. I win!

Cheap Tuesdays!

Today started off with some more boring orientation stuff. We were guided through campus and sat in on a talk given by our department, but it didn't really apply to exchange students like myself because most of us are entering into higher level classes and already have the prerequisites completed. After all the boring stuff we had the most delicious pizza lunch out behind the student union and I don't think I could've been happier. Well, unless it was Lou Malnati's or something like that. I wanted to take care of registering for two more classes today so that I would have a full course load, but that turned out to be a nightmare. I went to the faculty of science and engineering to get approved for the coral reef ecology class that I really wanted to take, but wasn't approved for because when I had applied i was still taking the prerequisites and didn't have grades for them yet. After the difficulty I had finding that, the lady gave me a form and a copy of my transcripts and told me I had to go talk to an academic adviser for my program to finish sorting things out. She then pointed me in the direction of building 21. It took me a good 15 minutes to find the building, seeing as the maps we have of campus are sometimes very hard to read. After finally getting there I walked inside and was very confused on where I was supposed to be. Luckily, a nice man walked out of his office and I inquired where I could find Orpha, the woman who was to be doing my advising. He didn't know who the hell she was or where to find her, and at first I thought I had gotten her name wrong. After all, who the hell names their kid Orpha? He asked why I needed to see her and for what course, and then he told me that I should've been directed to building 28, because the one I was in was actually that of molecular biology. I was getting pretty overwhelmed at this point, but I set off anyways to find building 28 this time. This one didn't take me quite as long because i recognized the marine biology building. I found where I was supposed to be and double checked with the woman, but I had to come back an hour and a half later when walk-in meetings were available. Fast forward an hour and a half to meeting time. I got there early because I was in a hurry to get back to hanging with the cool kids at George Roberts. Turns out, Orpha is basically 4'7" and possibly the spawn of satan. She told me that I hadn't listened to my orientation meeting and that she wouldn't be doing any of this for me until Wednesday after I checked my schedule to make sure none of the class times would clash with one another. I also wouldn't be helped because she had other students to attend to. In all reality, I was the only person on the second floor and it would've taken her two seconds to sign off on my sheet instead of being such a dumb, condescending wench about the whole thing. So yes, now tomorrow at 10:30 I have to find another building and go to another orientation meeting just to learn about my schedule and how to read it and how to tell if classes don't go, at which point she will sign off.

After all of that mess Lisa and I hit up the mall so I could get my cell phone and pick up some other things. The mall wasn't that exciting, but we did try on some sassy silver sequined dresses. On the bus ride home it was just us and the bus driver, and he asked if we were in a hurry. We said he could take his time, but he informed us that he would like us to be in a hurry so he could get this bad boy moving! We had the most lovely conversation with him on the ride home. He told us all about where he lives more inland in the bush, where some good restaurants are, and that we should definitely eat kangaroo. As a matter of fact, he hunts kangaroo with a bow and arrows and makes jerky out of it, among other things. HOW COOL IS HE?!

The most exciting part of today was that it was cheap tuesday! That means that all drinks are cheap and that we would be going downtown to hit up the bars/clubs this evening. Before going out, a lot of us went to Dave-O's room to hang out. I kept it classy with some boxed wine that I'm pretty sure they affectionately refer to as "Goon". I learned how to play the game king's cup, and it was just really nice to socialize with a lot of people that weren't just americans. After most people were sufficiently boozed up, we got on the bus to get downtown. The bus ride turned out to be great! Only 6 or so of us had made it onto the first bus because everybody else was being too much of a drunkard to pay attention to the bus schedule. We had a lot of good laughs, mostly making fun of american accents and especially of how nasally some of my vowels are. We also broke down in some bus-wide singing, belting out hits such as Ain't No Mountain High, Don't stop believing, and I'm pretty sure there was backstreet boys or N*sync in there somewhere too. The first bar we stopped at was called Mad Cow and it was a blast. I got my dance on and was able to continue talking to this super cute boy who lives over in GR with all of my buddies. I also found a drink that is absolutely delicious. It is called a Vodka Raspberry and it rivals the deliciousness of pina coladas. I only had to pay for one drink that night, a rum and coke, and this guy bought me and the ladies a vodka razz each for us all to try. I continued to get my dance on, because us Gucinski's are such professional dancers, and just kept enjoying the great night out I was having with all of these random people. Eventually I got my dance on with previously mentioned cute boy and Lisa proceeded by playing the most excellent wing man the world has ever seen. He asked for my recently obtained cell phone number, which she provided because I had no clue what it was, and after we had switched bars and he had left for the evening he sent me the most lovely goodnight text. Thank you, Lisa!

Moral of the story is: Australia is the greatest place in the entire world and I've already had more fun here than i think I've ever had back home at school. The people are great, the location is great, and the accents are hilarious and quite endearing.

First Day of Orientation

Today kicked off orientation week for the international students. I had to attend a basic seminar about classes, enrollment, health insurance, etc. It didn't take too long and afterward there was a barbecue for all of us in the fine arts center where they had live entertainment, free food, and raffles. We had hotdogs, or I guess you could call them the Australian equivalent. They were probably 50% longer than regular hotdogs, sort of more sausage-like, and you eat them on regular bread instead of buns. Whatever they were, they were downright delicious. I didn't win any of the raffle prizes, but I did run into that obnoxious girl from San Diego that I first met on the bus ride to campus. She sat behind me during the seminar and kept complaining about how she didn't want to have to listen to people ask questions at the end. There were only two people who asked questions and I was one of them. Luckily for me, I was talking to another kid at the barbecue who also confirmed her HUGE attitude problem. I was quite glad that other people had noticed too.

After the barbecue I went back to my room for a little down time. I hadn't planned on getting a phone, but everybody here seems to be getting one and I don't want to be left out. After a little convincing from Jean Slana, I quickly ran back to the bbq to get my free sim card from the phone guy and put $40 on it, which should last me the entire semester. Tomorrow I will go and buy a cheap phone to put it in. After that quick change of mind I spent the majority of the afternoon sitting out on my balcony reading my book.

A little before dinner I met up with the ladies to help them move from their temporary Uni Hall housing into George Roberts where the boys, and all of the other cool kids that I've met so far, are living. I'm definitely sad to see them go. It's at least a good five minute walk and now I won't have anybody to walk me back late at night. Luckily for me Cameron is a pretty good guy and said he wasn't going to let me walk back alone so he escorted me home this evening. But anyways, I ate dinner with them at their dining hall and met another cool aussie, Peta. After we spent some time hanging out in Jeppo's room, bumming around watching youtube videos and listening to music. All in all i'd say it was a pretty good night. Tomorrow we're headed downtown to a bar called mad cow because tuesday nights are cheap drink nights. I also believe that this is the kind of bar that has dance music, which means I will surely be debuting my dance moves. I hope they can handle them!

Oh yeah, those Norwegians who are temporarily living in my building before finding off campus housing keep leaving the toilet seat up. Come on now, it's not hard to put it back down when your done. This is getting ridiculous.