I enjoy long walks on the beach...

soooo, last night I was actually being a good student. I had bought a book and printed out an article for class to read and I had my pencil and highlighter in hand ready to attack the homework. And I did so, for about 30 minutes, and then a rain storm happened. It began like any other rain storm. Lots and lots and lots of LOUD thunder. And then it started to sound violent, and I opened up my door in the hall, and the noise was almost deafening. And there is this glass covered bit of the hallway a few doors down from me, and it was leaking. I guess the glass wasn’t sealed well with the adjoining wall.

So my neighbor called the on duty RA to inform her, and I went back to my room to read and highlight. Dude, this storm was crazy. It sounded like an army was beating the building up. I’m surprised my windows didn’t break. But you know what did happen? My ceiling started to leak. Yep. It started dripping through my fire alarm. Which incidentally, I had just placed my laptop on my chair right underneath it, to get it off my bed. But luckily my laptop is fine. I sat it upside down for a bit on a towel. So I put a pot under the drip and called downstairs to the RA and she said she’d be here ‘momentarily’.

I then noticed that the ceiling light next to my fire alarm was filling up with water. It has one of those bowl like fixtures around the bulb.. and yep… after watching it fill up for about 10 minutes and moving my expensive stuff out of the way, it fell from the ceiling and shattered on my floor. Dumping out all the water it had just gathered. Awesome. So I go into the hallways and it was pure madness. (by the way, it’s about midnight at this point). And everyone is running around the halls soaking wet. All the glass covered areas are dripping, all the hall lights are leaking, everyone is having water come through their fire alarms. And I look outside into the courtyards and it looks like there is a layer of what seems to be snow. I go downstairs with some friends and people are having “iceball” fights. Because it’s not snow on the ground at all, it’s all the hail that has accumulated. So after running around in ice and taking pictures I went back up to my room and eventually around 1:00 I found the ra and she came in and wrote on her clipboard what had happened and said they will get back to me tomorrow. So now it’s 2am and I finish my reading because I am wide awake by this point.

So then I wake up at 8:00 and get dressed for class (which was going to be from 9-2 straight then a 4-6 lab) and go downstairs to reception to ask about what they are gonna do with my wet carpet and my light that I’ve yet to turn on because I don’t know how safe that’ll be since a trashcan full of water was just running through it. And I find out the whole campus has been closed. Pretty much the whole city due to all the roof damages and leaking problems and wet carpets throughout. Insane! My fullest day is cancelled! And I stayed up until almost 3 preparing for it! But then I went back to my room and slept til noon. So today was a pretty good day.
The dorm people came by to see the damage, they undid my fire alarm (but I have a second one that acts as a warning, so if that goes off then I should call the fire people since my real fire alarm now doesn’t work.. so don’t worry… I’m not gonna die in a fire) and now I just have a fan blowing on my carpet. I hope mold doesn’t grow and I die. Let alone die in the hallway, there are so many wet areas. Stupid brand new building built cheaply!!

Apparently Canberra had just experienced a freak hail storm in the summer that not only was the university not prepared for, but neither was the city. The whole city shut down….. on the news they are saying it was one of the most intense and damaging storms in the city’s history. And now they are blaming global warming.

Hahaha, the news just said classes are cancelled til Monday so I just checked:
“The storm on Tuesday night caused damage to some 70 buildings on the ANU campus. Damage ranges from relatively minor to extensive.StudentsOwing to the damage to our teaching spaces, the University will not conduct lectures, tutorials or laboratory sessions on Wednesday 28 February, Thursday 1 March or Friday 2 March.”

This is crazy and all of this going on during their biggest drought.

Anyway, moving on…

Phrases my friends say all the time and the rest of the world assumes Australians use… and they do…:
Give it a go
Can’t be bothered (sometimes, when my friend is real mad, she’ll say ‘can’t be effed’) (but she says the real word. It’s weird. That doesn’t even make sense)
When I told her how I think it’s funny that she says ‘can’t be bothered’ so much, she goes ‘well what do you say?’ and I said ‘I don’t know, like ‘I don’t want to’’ and she said that sounded childish. Then I told her that ‘can’t be effed’ sounded mature.

So, some of you prob know, cause I think the rest of the world does this.. they do write their dates different than us stupid independent Americans. They do day/month/year. Which does make sense, within the ranking of measurements of time. But it messes with my head… each time I read a date.

Well this might be boring for some... but I figured I should get around to explaining exactly what my classes are (and I don’t know much cause I’ve only had about a week of classes… but here ya go anyway):

Primate Evolutionary Biology

2 lectures and 1 discussion. It is an undergrad course, with probably 35 students in it, 5 of whom are postgrad, and maybe 10 guys in the class.

So far we’ve just had a brief introduction/overview of taxonomy/classification. Gone through some suborders, then to families, staying fairly broad for now. But just looking at the difference between like bush babies and tarsiers and lemurs. Tuesday we went over opposable toes and differences in the rhinarium. Crraaazzzy

The prof is older and cool. he’s one of those brilliant guys that knows absolutely everything. He’s actually my advisor, he’s like the only one in Australia that does biological anthropology. He loves him his monkeys. He uses power point and posts his lectures online which is really nice.

Race and Human Genetic Variations

2 lectures, 1 video, 1 post-grad discussion

about 40 people, and maybe 3 guys. I don’t know how many grad students yet cause our discussion was cancelled due to the repairs from the hail storm.

this professor is kinda harder to follow in his lectures. Cause his sentences go on forever and I can never really figure out the main point of what he’s talking about… but he does have power point but said he’s only gonna post the first few lectures online… I don’t know why not all of them. I guess to make sure we all come to class.

But this class I find fairly boring, cause it’s what introduction to anth in undergrad talked a lot about. How race is a cultural creation and not biological…. I just read over 40 pages on people using big words to say it is due to societal pressures of power and the basic instincts in humans to have a hierarchical system in place that we create ‘races’ to differentiate ourselves so we can compare ourselves and place people on their rungs on the ladder. Blar blar blar. I don’t care about people alive today, I want to talk about dead people!!

And I’ve only seen one video, which is one is a series of like 7 videos that we will begin our semester with. It was fairly cool though, about the race to find the shape of dna.

At our last lecture he wore a shirt that said ’98.7% chimp”. I want that shirt.

Human Skeletal Analysis

1 lecture, a 2 hour lab

I think this class is gonna be my favorite. It reminds me of my zooarchaeology class in undergrad which was my fave. I just like looking at bones and memorizing them. We were supposed to do the postcranial part of the body today, but due to that damn storm it got cancelled… I’m not sure how their make-up sessions are gonna be. But learning 206 bones is gonna be quite a feat, with or without hail.

The prof is younger, maybe 30’s and a thick accent. He says ‘bloke’ a lot in class. It consists of around 40 people, I don’t know the guy/girl ratio, I forget, because it’s been a week since my last lecture. The labs are cool. there are only 2 lab tables, so everyone crowds around and he brings out casts and real bones for people to look at. And the fake ones you know, go together like a puzzle, so you take then apart and inspect them individually then try to rebuild the skull or body or whatever we’ll be looking at.

Anyway, not too much work for each class. Just an essay and a final I think for all classes. 2 of them you have to give a presentation. My first one will be in like 5 weeks about ‘what is a species?’ I picked the easiest topic. Others were like ‘why did lemurs migrate here?’ or ‘why are there so many species of bushbabies? What does it mean?’ or ‘explain the shifting river barriers in central Africa and shifting sea levels in asia?’ which I’m sure won’t be that hard… but nothing can be easier than just defining what a species is.

So anyway, since I wrote the above part of my blog and now, I went downstairs to the common room to celebrate a peer’s birthday. he’s from Houston actually. Anyway, it was fun, I spent most of the night outside talking at the picnic tables and here ya go:

What you wear to the gym are called : Trackies. No other name for them here.
Gym shoes are called: Runners (in Ireland I believe they call them trainers)
I tried to explain that in the south we call them tennis shoes no matter what, but in the northeast they are called sneakers. But no on believed that we called them tennis shoes until the guy from Missouri backed me up. Thank goodness for the south.

And as I sit here, a friend from Aussie asked me to go to a bay with her and from friends. So tomorrow I’ll be putting on my ‘swimmers’ (as they call them) and checking out the beach. Then that’ll be followed by a shower, and then a hit at a bbq my dorm is putting on then a night out on the town. I’m very excited to get out of the city and see the beach. Yayaya!

Ladies Lounge

Saturday night was big at the club again. They had free cocktails for ladies in the ‘candy bar’ they temporarily named 'Ladies Lounge" from 10 to 11. I had 4. They were small, in a martini glass, I didn’t even feel anything, but they were free and tasted delicious. Very very girly, and pink, what else could I have asked for?

Still, the girls are fascinated with my accent. I was sitting with an Australian and a British girl and we were having each other say the most stereotypical sentences our home countries offered in our home dialect. The aussie said ‘shrimp on the barbie’. The brit said ‘it’s time for tea and crumpets’. Then they looked at each other to decide what to have me say and they debated ‘hmm... what do Americans eat?….. Waffles? Yeah, say waffles!’

Anyway, so all the girls and I danced all night. Most of the girls went home at around 1 while a friend and I stayed later. She wanted to dance with the hottest guy in the room, so we found one with a friend and I pushed her next to him and we all danced… Anyway, at 2:30 (after they ordered 2 rounds of Smirnoff ice) they wanted to leave and go to another suburb and keep on clubbing. My 18 year old drunk friend wanted to go. But I said ‘no thank you’ then had to explain to my friend that going with 2 drunk boys in their car to another city at 3am isn’t really a good idea. Proud?

But on our way home we sat down near our dorm to talk and this drunk old man stumbled over wanted to know the bus schedule. First of all, I don’t think the buses here run at 3am, but I used my thickest American accent to tell him we don’t know anything about this city and convinced him my friend was from New York. She just kept saying ‘yeah’ (the only thing she can say without an Australian accent) haha, it was hilarious, but we were also drunk, so it was really hilarious to us.

Moving on, we came home and hung out in the common room with some peeps playing ping pong and I ended up exploring google earth with a guy for 30 minutes. I don’t know how or why, but it was cool. He showed me his high school that was on the beach, I showed him my high school and pointed out where the big statue of Jesus was… where, as a class, we once placed bras in his open hands. He showed me his house, which was a 5 second walk to the beach, and I showed him my house with my old station wagon in the driveway. His locations seemed much cooler than mine. He laughed because I grew up with an 8 hour drive to the beach. I laughed because he never saw 50 kids run after sheep trying to take a ribbon of the tails at a state rodeo. I won that one.

On the news tonight, they announced the city had its first road fatality of the year. That’s insane! Well it’s amazing really, I guess it just goes to show was a small place this is… or what amazing drivers Aussies are. But they aren’t… they kinda scare me.

So, as I’m sure most of you are aware, it was Oscar weekend. They were actually happening when it was Monday afternoon here, but they delayed it and played it prime time at 8pm Monday night. I stayed up the whole time, trying to see if I could get a glimpse of my friend back stage, but they never showed her. HOWEVER I did see her name on the credits! Good job E.! I’m so proud and jealous! :) and I expected ellen to have prettier suits. She dresses better everyday on her show. And you know, I feel like I saw her for about 8 minutes total. The host doesn’t really get a lot of airtime, does he/she? And I must say, that sparkly beaded curtain in the back was amazing (ok… it just looked fine, but I know how much time went in to that one curtain, so good job again E)

I spent another 50 bucks using taxis today going to and from the hospital just so the nurse could look at my left forearm and say ‘yep, nothing there, you don’t have TB, I’ll tell the doctor. You’ll hear from me in a few weeks.” I want my 50 bucks back.

My friend calls sunglasses: sunnies
It seems everything is given a cute nickname here.

Burger King here is Hungry Jacks

Samuel L. Jackson’s on Letterman promoting Shreveport…. silly Samuel l. Jackson, he just hangs out in the casinos… he’s not seeing what Shreveport can really offer. You know, the woods. WORST WOODS I have ever worked through. EVER. Worse than savannah. Although savannah had more snakes and the threat of alligators, it didn’t have as many impenetrable walls of briars. Thanks Louisiana.

I did laundry today. They look like the exact machines i had at undergrad. Except after washing and drying my 2 loads, I had spent 12 bucks. Also, I can’t find dryer sheets anywhere. Do they not use them?

The gym here is having a week of free work out classes. Today my friend and I went to BodyCombat. It was really fun. jab jab hook hook. They have it 3 times a week, so I might spend 110 bucks to go. Tomorrow we’re gonna try Aerobic Dancing. They have lots more classes, but those are the ones we think we might enjoy. But the class was choreographed to really great music. The darkness, Kelly Clarkson, britney spears, yeah, it was amazing! And I’m not even being sarcastic here.

I have one whole class tomorrow, then I was gonna spend the rest of it in the library reading. I only have like 1 chapter to read, but I have to find the book first.

Love you all to pieces!!

1 brick, 2 brick, red brick, blue brick

so everyone knows about the wildlife of Australia. The rare creatures, the crazy jumping mammals, and how they have lots of birds. However, the loads of birds they have... they sound like babies crying and kids screaming… at first… then once the mind processes that it is a bird… their calls become little prettier. Just a little.

And I haven’t seen a kangaroo yet, but I’m on the lookout. I’ve met a Canadian here, and that’s our mission. To see a kangaroo.

Also, they don’t really say ‘loads’ or ‘lots’ here.. it’s “heaps”. Everything is in ‘heaps’. Heaps of books, heaps of homework, heaps of people who don’t wear deodorant. Which I’m sad to say, is so true. I wish deodorant was mandatory if someone wants to be set loose in public. And then, when you get in the elevator with one of those people who don’t care for others’ nasal passages, it’s even better.

So I went to the gym yesterday, and on the weight machines... the weight blocks were numbered. 1, 2, 3… with no markings of their individual weight.

I was like ‘what is this?’
my friend: ‘oh, that’s how much weight you are gonna lift. You know, 1 brick, 2 bricks..’ (they think I don’t know anything because I don’t say mobyle or toots.)
Me: yeah, but how much does a ‘brick’ weigh?
My friend: oh I don’t know… just try a few and see how many bricks you can lift

So I sighed and used 5 bricks with my legs today. I’m thinking each brick is probably about 5 kilos… which would add up to 55 pounds… but I also don’t think I could do 3 reps of 55 pounds…. So I have no idea. But maybe I can! Or maybe the world should measure weight the same.

Also at the gym, the cardio room is fairly nice. Good amount of machines of different activities, and a stretching area. It has 6 tvs and each work out machine has a tiny remote type deal, where you can plug your headphones in and be patched in to any of the tvs. So that was cool. I put it on the ‘music’ tv and got to hear:
The fray, daughtry, gwen stefani, meth-face (more popularly known as fergie), the fray, gwen stefani, with a few others in between. They really love their fray and gwen here. I should have listened to Bill Bryson on my ipod.

Anyway, it has huge windows that over look the creek... and across that creek is the ‘beer garden’… the outdoor huge patio attached to the university bar in the middle of campus… this means… when one is drinking in the middle of the afternoon, such as many were today (it was 2:30 people, c’mon!), they can glance across the creek to watch people doing their cardio. Or, the other way around, the only thing the cardio people get to watch, are people drink beer on park benches. I don’t envy either side of that creek.

Even more so, with the 200 dollars I paid today to join, that’s not free admittance to the group classes. That’ll be another 110 dollars please.

But on the plus side, my friend has a car here. Which is so magical. We went and saw Music and Lyrics last night and I liked it. But I’d like anything Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore were in. and a song in it “Pop! Goes my heart!” is very catchy and we were singing it all night.
On the way home, we were driving on the freeway and she has a giant plastic card hanging on the inside of her windshield on the passenger side that has a big P on it that faces the outside. So I point to this and ask what it is…

her response: oh… that’s for construction
Katie: oohh, oh…kay… thought it was for parking or something
Her: you can’t park on the freeway!
(obviously we aren’t talking about the same thing)
Katie: no, I mean this giant card…
Her: ohhh, well when you first get your license you have to hang an L (for ‘learners’’) from your window until you get your actual permit (the P), then for the first 3 years you have yours you hang the P.

(By the way, when I pointed to the windshield she thought I was pointing outside… to the construction cones lining the highway. I swear, they think I’ve been living under a rock.)

For homework, I only have a few chapters to read before next week… out of books that are not in stock at the co-op, and probably not in the library. So this weekend will be full of searching for said books.

By the way, the other night, the fire alarm went off. Not mine… but someone’s on the second floor. So the entire building piled out onto the streets, and many people took the ‘lift’ down… as I did (best plan for a fire) and waited outside for the firemen to arrive. And it just so happens that the room that set the fire off was facing the front, so we watched the firemen enter… look around... and save the building by opening the room’s windows. So hey, if you are making some food, and it’s burning, open your windows… that way you won’t disturb 450+ people at 10:00 at night. Moreover, when we got back from the movie last night, everyone was exiting the building. Another fire alarm. Due to cooking. Oh dorm living.

By the way, like Europe (I think)… there is no tipping. And it is so nice. I feel like I save so much money! I love it at the bar: 2 drinks please. 4 dollars? Here’s a 5. oh wait, I get 1 in return. And I get to keep that 1. I love it.
I did tip a cab driver once in the rain… a whole $1.85. I feel kinda guilty when I don’t tip… but I have to remind myself that they aren’t expecting it and nobody does it. It feels weird… but I still love it.

And can somebody PLEASE explain to me their coffee system
So on menus they have white and black coffee.
My mother and I figured white was for cream or milk in it… that’s what we think, we aren’t sure yet.
But moving on to the more complicated ‘black coffee’… for the same price, you can have a Long black coffee or a Short black coffee… what is the difference? And I’ve asked a few people here, all 18 years old, and they are like ‘oh, I don’t know, are you sure they are the same price?’ and yes, yes they are. I’ve checked at numerous locations.

I'll analyze your skeleton... baby

ok, so classes have officially started… and now that they have added on discussions and labs (that are called Tutorials, and everyone calls them Toots) my schedule is more full than I originally thought. My Mondays and Fridays are still free, and Tuesday I still only have 1 class, but Wednesdays I have class from 9-6. awesome. And Thursday I have class from 10-2. oh well, I’m sure undergrad was still worse, considering I was handling 5 classes then. Anyway, all my classes are also mixed with undergrads. I think actually most of them are heavily undergrad students. So I get to do an undergrad class and get grad credit, sounds good to me! So today I had my full day, and it wasn’t that bad, and for the last 2 hours, I got to examine real human skulls, which was awesome. And I now know what the ethmoid, postorbital constriction, and mastoid process are… which I’m sure I will forget in a week. And don’t worry, since most of y’all are nearing your mid-20’s, I’m sure your basilar suture is already fused.

And man, I love being in school. I bought spirals, and binders, and a 3 hole punch today. I’ve organized my spirals with colors along with the color coordinating highlighters. I can’t wait to print out pictures of the body and paste them on note cards. I love all the organizing busy work… I just don’t like reading it all after it’s all pretty. But I really have missed sitting in a classroom and learning. I’m sure I’ll get over all of this in let’s say… 9ish days… but I’m loving it right now. And I don’t know how we did it in high school, taking all our notes on our laptops. I tried today, and all I wanted was a notebook and sparkly pencil.

So one of my classes, Human Skeletal Analysis… everyone here pronounces it ‘ska-lee-tal’. It’s really weird.
And the herb, basil is pronounced like a bloke’s name: where the Bas rhymes with “has”.
And they call McDonalds: Macker. One girl asked me to go to ‘mackers’… she was like ‘gasp!! you don’t know what mcdonalds is?’ no, you aussie, I know what mcdonalds is, I have been living in america, I just don’t know your stupid nick name. see the difference?. I didn’t say all that, but I should have.

Tomorrow I’m gonna join the school gym. And get this… membership isn’t counted in your tuition… I think it’s like 200 bucks to join. One girl was telling me in Melbourne, she was paying 250 a month at her gym. What is wrong with these people, they have all this money to throw around!

In any given night, there are at least 3 game shows in a television line up. I can’t handle it.

also, voting here is mandatory. you get in trouble with the law if you don't vote. which could be good or bad...

I don’t have much to say this time I guess, I’ve been trying to prepare for schooling and not really learning about the differences here. It has been storming here every night. I like their thunder. However, I haven’t been sleeping well here. I have horrible dreams. One, my deceased grandfather was alive and needed a heart transplant, but he didn’t know it, and we weren’t allowed to tell him. We kept saying we were gonna take him to the fair. And so my mother was freaking out, I apparently ‘couldn’t be bothered’ because I was looking for a prom dress, and my father only cared about fixing his game boy, that got wet in the recent flood. And last night, I dreamt I was driving an Aerostar van and it was really hard to keep it from rolling backwards on hills even if I pressed the brake with all my might, and just when I thought I had figured it out… I rolled backwards out of control through the middle of campus and I was running over hundreds of people and I could hear them dying and people screaming and I thought it was real. I heard the blood splatter. Yeah yeah yeah, real gross, but dude, I thought I was going to jail. Except one night I kept Arrested Development on and heard Gob in my dream. That sleep wasn’t too bad :)

Anyway, I’m off to check my brick for class tomorrow to make sure I don’t have any homework.

I hope I’ll have more stories for this weekend! However on Friday, I have to go to the hospital to have an Australian doctor x-ray me to make sure I don’t have TB. It was the only way I could get my visa. Oh man, I don’t have TB.

Loves!!

Tomatoes... Tomahtoes...

ok, I know this isn’t about me.. but can we please take a moment to think about britney spears. After her ‘lesbian romps’ she checked herself into rehab and checked out the same day. And after her few hours in rehab, she was obviously well again because she then shaved her head (which apparently was a headline for all major news stations (inlcuding cnn i heard)). It’s like she’s living out Empire Records. If she starts walking around in an apron and her underwear, I might throw up a little in my mouth.

And more on celebrity gossip: I bought my first Australian gossip magazine(s)! and there are quite a few articles on people I know nothing about… except now their wedding pictures, their ‘baby tragedy’, princely duties, and birthday celebrations. And now Lohan might be pregnant? Ralph Fiennes is part of the mile high club? Nicole Richie wants to elope before she goes to jail? omg, so much i've missed out on.

However, with one of my magazines, I received a ‘free singlet’ and upon opening it’s a tank top that says “Mrs. Beckham”. The magazine claims the shirt is valued at $20. I’m so lucky.

And seriously, everything here comes in a chicken flavor option. Not only just chips, and crackers, I found chicken flavored cheese. What is this all aboot? And as far as I can tell, all big grocery stores are in their malls, like department stores. It’s very strange.

The shopping carts are called trolleys
Sometimes Jewelry is jewellery
Raisins are sultanas
and just so you know if you didn't already, Aussies is pronounced Ozzies.

Australia also has it’s own version of Family Feud, America’s (Australia’s) Got Talent, Biggest Loser, 1 vs. 100, and I’m sure there are plenty more. BUT the simpsons are really big here, maybe even bigger than in america.

They are in love with Kylie Minogue… who apparently has a sister, Dannii, that everyone also adores… ugh

The second season of Grey’s Anatomy premiered last nite. Along with the series premiere of Ugly Betty and What About Brian…. The tv does lag a little here… HOWEVER it is on schedule with ‘men in trees’. Why? That show looks horrible.

One sad thing to report, is I am not a very good vegan over here at all. I can’t find soy cheese! (ok, I take that back, I found one soy cheese flavor today: Chive… no thanks). I did however get soy butter, soy sour cream, soy cream cheese, and soy milk. But then I got yogurt, cheese, and chocolate. Also, they don’t have morningstar, boca, or smart dogs… but weird looking fake sausages that i’m willing to try, but I’m not guaranteeing anything. I did buy thai flavored tofu, so we’ll see how that goes. AND I can’t find soy protein powder anywhere!

By the way, I am in love with the office. And I mean in love.

So I have my first class tomorrow. At 10am, hope I can wake up for it! And I hope they don’t assign 20 chapters and 2 essays.

Miss you all!!

Girls just wanna have fun

Ok, so it's been a while since i posted... but that's because nothing interesting really happened. i went out for a few drinks on thursday night, but i stayed in friday night. by the way, apparently for postgrad work, they don't really require text books. they do however require 'bricks'. everyone kept telling me to get my 'bricks'. it took me a while to figure out that they were referring to class packets... like class 'readers'. just stapled paper that the professor puts together that includes a calendar of lectures and outside readings.... 'bricks'. why on earth would you call them bricks. and also, the only real book i bought for class, that wasn't even required, was only 40 dollars. i wish texts at uconn were this cheap. i spent 45 dollars on class readings. amazing!

so saturday i tried to organize my desk... and after 5 minutes of that i then watched the office and arrested development. i also did some billy blanks boot camp tapes, and my thighs are mad at me now.

on saturday night my dorm was hosting a Lunar Potluck party so i attended and i met a fun group of girls who wanted to go dancing. they were all 18, and one was 17. all here for their first year... i feel a little bit older... but eh, i hope i don't look it.

so we parted ways, got ready, and then headed out to the club, academy. and we danced, a lot. they had an hour of 2 for 1 drinks, so we all walked around with 2 drinks for the hour (2 drinks for 6 bucks... not too shabby australia)... but don't worry, i stayed within my limits of coherenceness. we did meet a number of guys, all creepy and sleezy, one of whom told me he gives "Texas an A+ for producing me".... that's when i walked away. he also shaved his arms... for rugby... i don't get it

anyway, we came back at around 2... even though the club stays open until 4am or later if the party is still going. that's insane!! and i woke up today... so tired. however, when i came home at 2am, i decided i was hungry, so i was gonna make myself a veggie burger. and for some reason i thought it would be a good idea to put it in the microwave for 6 minutes.. and then being a little drunk i forgot about it until i smelled smoke. yep, i burnt the burger into my plastic plate and it produced a horrible smell and a lot of smoke. i then tried to fan the room by opening and closing my front door, then i kept it propped open with a flip flop while i waved a dish towel in the air so that i wouldn't set off the alarm. i also would open the microwave and let a little smoke out at a time.. until i took the plate and burger to the garbage shoot and just threw it out. and now whenever i microwave, i get a little bit of the burnt smell, to always remind me that veggie burgers only need about 2 minutes to be cooked.

anyway, we're gonna go have dinner tonight and i'm very excited to be getting out with people! :)

also, last night, the girls couldn't stop laughing at my 'accent'. they yelled at me when i said cell phone (they strictly only say mobile... pronounced 'moe-byle'), they giggled when i said 'y'all', and were confused when i said freshman (they say 1st, 2nd, 3rd year... exclusively)... it was fun.

oh, and they all call me texas... it's like freshman year at college (i'm sorry: university) all over again :) how i've missed it!!

Academy (sports and outdoors, the right stuff the right price!)

I enroled (they only use one L) today! I am now officially an ANU student, with my own student id card and everything. But with enroling they won’t let you take more than 3 classes a semester. So I’m supposed to take 6 classes during this year and they’ll give me a masters? Just like that. Also, my schedule for the first semester:
Monday: no classes
Tuesday: 10am Primate Evolutionary Biology
Wednesday: 9am PEB, 10am Race and Human Genetic Variation, 1pm Human Skeletal Analysis
Thursday: 10am R&HGV
Friday: no classes

Huh…. What?? That’s it?

Anyway, yesterday was a pretty good day. like i said in the previous post, I met up with a boy I met at international orientation, and we hung out in Union Center for about an hour and it was nice. I then came home and slept, haha, I didn’t want to wake up, but eventually I did and I went to the international dinner and dance. And omg, it was awesome! I sat down with the boy I hung out with earlier and I actually knew a girl at the table. But anyway, I met 2 germans, a French boy, and a Filipino! And seriously, all the free alcohol, anu is crazy. Open bar! I also met an American! He’s from Missouri, and he’s fabulous. Anyway, after the dinner and dance, where I had about 4 glasses of wine, we went into the city to a bar/dance club Academy and it was a lot of fun. It got very sweaty dancing all night, but apparently Europeans love them their dancing and it was amazing. Anyway, I came home eventually and passed out. Then I woke up to meet with my professor and register for classes. I probably should have not been so hung over, but whatever. Enrolment went well as I’ve already told y’all my schedule.

ANU also had all their organizations and groups with their own tables throughout the university’s center so I perused possible groups and I joined the Archaeologist group. Yaya nerds! They did have the ANU War-gaming Group and Role Playing Society, but I opted not to join. But now you know there’s always something for everybody.

Anyway, I’m back in my room now and after a few errands this afternoon perhaps I’ll get another nap!
Then tonight I believe it is going to be another night out with a trip to Academy, thank goodness I don’t have to meet with my professors tomorrow!

and hopefully i'll be putting up pictures on myspace and facebook soon, the campus is quite lovely.

Love and hugs!!

watch out, i might walk into you

(ok, I wrote this yesterday on the 13th but I’m just posting it today… so just remember, I wrote it yesterday)

Today is a new day. I don’t feel that pathetic anymore, hooray! I now have twice as many friends as I had yesterday. That’s right, I have 2 friends. Maybe if I continually make 1 friend a day, I’ll feel right at home.

So things I have noticed:
Obviously they drive on the opposite side of the road here. We drive on the right side they say they drive on the ‘correct’ side. Clever, clever. However, this also transfers over in to what side of the hallway or sidewalk you walk on. I have repeatedly been staying to the right, cause that’s how it is in America, and thus many times running into or startling people who are walking towards me. I am in their walking space; I should be on the left hand side of the hall. Furthermore, their escalators are placed backwards. You go up on the left side and come down on the right. I’m not used to this yet. And their elevators are called lifts. And their restrooms are called toilets. That’s the proper public way to refer to them. The toilets.

They spell roadside curbs as ‘kerbs’. Why? I have no idea.

They have a lot of different flavors of chips like ‘honey soy’ and ‘salsa and sour cream’ but one of their favorites seems to be ‘chicken’ and all sorts of kinds of chicken. I never noticed ‘chicken’ flavored chips back home, but perhaps there is a whole market for them in American of which I was unaware.

All Aussies answer questions with ‘yeah’ then go on to give their answer. They say ‘yeah’ as if acknowledging they understood your question and now they are prepared to answer.
Fer examps:
‘so you took 3 months off due to injury, how have you been coping?’
‘yeah, well it’s been hard’

‘do you sell newspapers here?’
‘yeah, actually we don’t, but they do down the street’

‘have you seen any ‘roos today?’
‘yeah, I haven’t’

they show oprah and days of our lives here. I hope I’ll be home during the afternoon to watch.

Apparently the prime minister here is not really revered as a great man. And as luck would have it, he’s bff’s with dubya. And now that their prime minister has spoken out against obama, the pm’s level of acceptance has gone down even more here. Dubya has made some good friends.

They call convenient stores ‘news agents’
Their pharmacies are called ‘chemists’

With their light switches, ON is down.

The pound button on the phone they call Hash

Their currency, Australian Dollars, is much better organized than ours. First of all, they outlawed 1 cent and 2 cent pieces back in the 80’s. THEY ROUND EVERYTHING. Today my bill at the grocery store was A$30.23. but they round to A$30.25. I think it’s fabulous. No large amounts of unnecessary change. AND if it had been A$30.22, I would have only paid A$30.20. such practical people here. However, they are huge fans of 1 dollar and 2 dollar coins. Considering a 5 dollar bill is their lowest note, they use the 1 dollar and 2 dollar coins often. It’s strange having coins of significant value, something I’ll have to get used to.
Furthermore, their bills are pretty. And as the amount of the bill goes up, the bill’s physical size gets larger. And each amount has it’s own color. AND, I guess for blind people? On each bill, depending on its amount, has a certain shape cut out in one of the corners and replaced with plastic. Like a windmill or a flower. Anyway, it’s sensible, practical, and pretty.

The fashion here is very much like American clothes; nothing too flashy and pretty comfortable. But ladies, Australian women LOVE the dress with oversized belt look. I mean, every woman is wearing some form of it.

And watching their parliament, the house of representatives, is awesome. It’s like the British house of Commons or Lords where you just debate all day and ask the prime minister or members of his cabinet direct questions. It seems they have an underlining set of rules on etiquette and respect, but it still allows for all sides (labor, national, liberal (pm’s party)) to take cheap shots at each other
Labor Party:
Deputy Prime Minister… it is reported that you were unaware of the announcement made by the Prime Minister last week concerning water cleaning. Does the Prime Minister tell you anything?
Oohhs and aahhs from the rest of the politicians

Labor Party:
Mr. Prime Minister, why did it take a vote in order to present the queen of England a gold encrusted carriage as a gift, yet you did not ask us for permission to take over the basin management project?
Ooohhhh, aahhhhh

They also must direct all statements to the speaker... ending all sentences with “Mr. Speaker.” It’s awesome. He has a gavel and yells out ‘order, order’ when the politicians get loud with grumbles in response to the answers given. And it seems as the answers get longer and longer, the member being questioned gets louder and louder. Screaming his points out of excitement. It’s fun. And the supportive side yells out ‘here, here’ after their party speaks. Everyone is constantly in the hot seat. Real life political debating... or just middle-aged men bickering for the sole purpose of inflating their egos.

I haven’t read any local celebrity gossip mags yet, but I’m looking forward to it. I did see a commercial for one, called Woman's Day... all about celebrities, i hope it's not expensive. I also subscribed to a year of the local newspaper for only 15 aus bucks, so now I’ll be just as informed as a local.

missing you all!

i've got friends in low places

i think i've made a friend.
a boy.
from australia.

we met at graduate student welcome. there were only about 30 of us that showed, to listen to our vice-chancellor speak, but i went. at the same time was the 'bar crawl' which i stopped in at before the graudate welcome. i bought a beer, walked around, saw no one i wanted to talk to, so i left. kinda sad and pathetic, but everyone had a friend so i drank my beer and left. i came back to my room and waited until 7 when the welcoming of grad students was to start. i walked over to the lecture room, sat and listened to the blah blah blah, and then we were excused to go enjoy the snacks and free alcohol they had waiting for us. i waited in line to get my glass of wine behind 2 girls who had just met. one from canada, and one from the uk. i kept waiting for a good moment to stick my hand out and introduce myself, but no moment arised.

so i stood there, scanning the room. then i saw a lone boy sitting with his wine in hand. i thought 'well eff it. i'll go introduce myself and if he's not friendly, then i'll leave, and no harm done'. i went over, introduced myself, and he was quite interesting and engaging. we had a nice chat, and it ends up he lives in the same dorm hall as i do. he then told me that our dorm was alcohol free. sha right, and monkies might fly out of my butt. we then decided to go buy alcohol and keep them in our rooms, thus breaking the rules. we are such rebels. anyway, i bought some wine, he bought some bailey's and we came back to my room and just talked for 2 hours. about politics, america vs. australia, music, movies, and the west wing! he loves the west wing. and it just so happens i own all 7 sesasons.
ok, so in the end there's no romantic connection, BUT I HAVE A FRIEND who just lives one floor below me. it just goes to show, if you put yourself out there, sometimes it's for the best.

ALSO
today:
before the free bbq, i found a coffee shop on campus that sold fruit smoothies. i asked for a strawberry one and i ended up with strawberry milk. their idea of smoothies is not like mine.

furthermore, do you guys know where the hole in the ozone layer is? oh yeah, it's over australia. whoo! skin cancer for everyone here!! no joke.

anyway, i'm off to sleep for tomorrow i am meeting up with someone i met from international orientation for the campus carnival. then there is a comedy hour, then the international BBQ dinner and dance. i've yet to taste the australian BBQ, but every free meal here consists of strickly that. i wonder if it's good... or vegetarian.

Cricks is Tote Awes

Well, my mother and I just said goodbye. So now I am officially alone in Australia. And let me tell you, ANU has set up quite a calendar of events for orientation week starting tomorrow to keep me occupied. They like to call it O-Week. They like abbreviations. In fact they love abbreviations. I think I might fit in here. For example, they don’t say afternoon all the time, they’ll say ‘avo’. I can hang with that, all avo.
Today my mother and I spent a good few hours watching cricket, England vs. Australia. We tried to figure out the rules by ourselves, but got nowhere. So after some internet research, we actually understood, and I dare say, enjoyed the game. It truly is a gentleman’s game. You cannot argue with the ump, use any profanity, and if you even throw the ball down in disgust or disappointment, you can be suspended from the game, and maybe even the whole year. Australia doesn’t look like they are going to beat England. They have to get 228 runs before 6 of the Australians get out. Not impossible, but they way these Aussies are playing, I’m not sure… and as I say that Australia just scored 4.
Anyway, let’s get back to the O-Week events. They have a BBQ everyday at lunch for free, a toga party, a bar crawl (or a coffee crawl if you’d rather attend that), a foam party, and last but not least, an hour of speed dating. That is on Wednesday, valentine’s day. I haven’t decided if I’m going, haha, but maybe if I have my own bar crawl before hand, I’ll stagger on in there.
My mother and I have many questions to ask Australians, but don’t know how to ask without making fools of ourselves, and at this moment I can’t think of 1, but I’ll start to write them down and maybe y’all can help answer them. By the way, I met an ‘RA’ here today who asked where I was from and when I replied USA… then Texas, he goes ‘oh the south! The resident manager’s daughter spent a year abroad at the Univ. of Texas… or was it Arkansas. Where is Arkansas?’ we replied saying it was a state Northeast of Texas. And his reply was ‘oh really?? Arkansas isn’t a part of Texas? I didn’t know Arkansas was a state.” So now I don’t feel so dumb that I didn’t know how many states Australia had.
Dude, cricket is pretty hardcore, I’m a fan; except the fact that games can last days. I think this one is going on about 9 hours. But in other sports, Australia seems to be a big fan of women’s sports. I’ve seen multiple women’s b-ball games and the women’s Queensland golf tournament on my 5 functioning channels, and no men playing except cricket.
Last night, during the commercial breaks for Jumanji, my mother and I tuned in to the Common Room station and watched a boy watch tv. He seemed lonely, my mother dared me to go talk to him, but I refused. I wanted to see how Robin Williams was going to get out of the quicksand floor.
So back to how expensive it is here. A foot long subway sandwich is over 8 dollars, a coke in a vending machine is 2.80, a margarita pizza is 13, a dictionary is 45. apparently it is because Canberra is “so far” from the ocean, everything arrives here by trucks. Stupid expensive trucks.
Well, I’m off to watch more cricket and head to bed, I have a free BBQ to get to tomorrow.
Love and hugs!

My First Australian Moments

Ok, so I’ve now been in Australia for 31 hours, and I’m not sure if I can remember everything that has happened.

I left my house in dallas at 4pm Monday afternoon. My dad drove my mother and me to dfw. With a very short line, we easily made our way to the ticketing booth. After off-centering our overweight bags on the scale so they measured less than 50 lbs we got our boarding passes and headed to the security line. Here my father parted ways with us. I cried. A good amount. But my mother and I got in line and problem free made it to our terminal. We boarded our plane on time, after I drank about a gallon large smoothie, and we were designated a window and middle seat. But low and behold, a strange little lady was in the window seat, so my mother and I fortunately got the aisle and middle. I slept most of the way on the plane to LAX, but was awoken every now and then when the strange lady at the window would rub my thigh with her foot. She was way weird.
We arrived in LAX in the gate directly next to the gate where our plane for Sydney was departing. Amazing, we don’t have to walk anywhere. We settle ourselves in some seats and I made some calls while my mother walked around investigating the stores in our terminal. When my mother returned she had learned our plane, scheduled to leave at 11:45pm is now leaving at 1:40 am. Shut up. It was 9:30 at this moment. My mother snuggles up on the ground to take a nap and I watch some episodes of ‘the office’ on my new ipod (xmas gift, thanks mom and dad!).

Nothing too amazing happened in those 4 hours at the airport. Saw what seemed to be some undergrad students going abroad to Sydney gathering and meeting one another. Saw what an airport looks like at 1am… closed and empty (I didn’t get to buy a midnight snack). Saw what my mother looks like sleep-deprived (a little scatter-brained). But soon enough, at 1:45, they began boarding about 700 of us, and not in a timely or organized manner. “Line up between the pylons in the center to the right” was repeated over and over. Huh… what does that mean.. no one knew. Well while waiting for them to call our row number, a ticketing agent said my mother’s bag was too large. So she took it. And my mother and I just hoped we’d find it when we landed in Sydney. When they took our boarding passes to shove through the machine, it beeped and we had to stand at the door for about 3 mins after checking out passports. My heart was racing, omg, they aren’t gonna let us on the planes. But ta-da! They handed them back. Eventually we were on a plane, with stewards and stewardesses who spoke with Australian accents. Oh man, I’m really gonna do this.

The flight was more or less uneventful. It was 14 hours long. I was fairly wide awake, so I looked through our movie selection. They had tons! And brand new ones! I ended up watching some episodes of the office they had, watched Marie Antoinette (it was horrible), the prestige (Christian bale is so my husband), and fast food nation (pretty good, except for showing all the beheading of the cows). Anyway, like I said, nothing really happened. And half a day later we found ourselves on Australian ground. Somehow while in the air, my mother and I did not experience a February 6th. This world blows my mind. Once we deplaned, we made our way to the line at customs. Oh thank goodness it’s only 300 people long. And no air conditioning, in 90 degree weather. Amazing.

Because we had left LAX so late, we knew we were going to miss our connecting flight in Sydney. But the airline had already booked us on the next plane leaving. However, customs was taking so long, we weren’t sure we were going to make it. Ok, well we will just try to get our baggage quickly. Btw, the customs lady didn’t ask us anything, she just stamped our passports. What if I had an apple? Or a snake? They would never know. Anyway, at the baggage claim, our 4 suitcases arrived undamaged. However, my mother’s carryon that was taken at the gate in LAX is nowhere to be found. We wait and wait. 10 minutes later with our hearts racing and time wasting, it finally comes strolling around on the carousel. Thank goodness my mother won’t have to wear the same shirt for her entire stay in Australia.
Ok, I realize this story sounds a bit boring. But we were freaking out, my mom’s carry on was missing! we were gonna miss our plane! We had 2 more long lines to stand in! But fine, we make it to the transfer counter to board the next plane. And yes, we missed the flight we were moved to, but don’t worry we now have 28 minutes til the next plane leaves for Canberra. We give her our luggage and she directs us towards security which doesn’t lead to a gate, but to a bus. We are the last to board the crowded bus, and we go on a 7 minute drive around the airport. Are we driving to Canberra? How big is this airport? We get off the plane and walk in, hooray, we see gates! We are at gate 4, we think our plane is at gate 15. the tv says our plane is now boarding. We quickly start to walk towards our gate. The next tv says ‘final call’. So I run. I run as fast as I can. It was like in the home alone movie. I was juking and jutting and jumping and breathing heavily. I see the sign for gate 15. I make my way around the corner… and no one is there. Then an older man in uniform appears and I say ‘are you still boarding?’

His response: ‘well if you have a boarding pass, of course love’. My mother comes around the corner a little bit later, and we go through the door… to another bus. Ok… where is this plane. Oh, it’s 30 feet away. Glad we got on this second bus. The plane is one of those baby planes that holds maybe 40 people. Then we were delayed another 20 minutes waiting on passengers. I wonder if they would have waited for us. Anyway, let me just say, the ride was a bit bumpy. So we finally make it to Canberra. We go to baggage, I meet the ANU greeters (who were very nice) and our baggage doesn’t show. But since our plane took off so late, the next plane from Sydney is only 5 minutes behind us. And hoorah! Our luggage was on that plane.
The ANU greeters give us almost like a gift card for a taxi. He takes us to my dorm hall, we don’t pay any money, and we walk in. yayay! I’m here. I then stand in line at the front desk for about 15 minutes while the workers are having language barrier problems with the new students ahead of me. I make it up there, and thank goodness they know who I am and they have a room for me. Oh but wait, ‘you paid 927 dollars, you still owe us 9.” 9 dollars. I owe them 9 dollars? Fine.
So I go up to the 5th floor, find my room, and it’s cute! Brand new, clean, but HOT. Take a quick look around… no AC. Internet doesn’t work. Hhmm… I don’t know how I can live like this. We check our watches and it’s 5:40. apparently all stores in Australia close at 5. well, my mother and I have no food, no linens, no towels, no shampoo, we better find something. We find the new mall, only a 10 minute walk. And it’s like a real mall, in a real city. Amazing! We find The Big W (kinda like a wal-mart, but smaller, and strange with what they offer) and luckily it is open until 6! And right now it’s 5:58. we rush in to get the basics, they start turning off the lights, but we manage to walk out with a pillow, linens, towels, toiletries, and a fan. However we look at prices, and this place is so expensive, and this is the cheap store! 8 dollars for a can opener, 16 dollars for a plastic filing box. But seriously, what is wrong with these people. Everything else in the mall is closed. And it’s 6:05!
We start walking back to my dorm room, and on the basement floor on the parking garage next to my dormitory is an IGA; a small grocery store. Here we spend 100 bucks getting the ‘necessities’ for a kitchen… and they have strange products in here as well. No juice but cheese flavored ‘tasty’. I don’t know what that means. I grab the Colby cheese.
We get back to my room, unpack our goodies, and walk over to my mom’s hotel on campus. It’s beautiful. A huge courtyard in the middle, with a koi pond, statues, and her room is rather large! With her own patio! This should be my dorm room. Anyway, it’s 9:00, we haven’t rested or eaten. The hotel has a restaurant that closes in 30 mins, so we make our way over and we don’t care how expensive it is, this is all we have. Looking at the menu, I could have ordered kangaroo, lamb brains, or a mussel salad, but I went with asparagus wrapped in spinach. It was so good and 13 dollars.

Anyway, that was my first day in Australia. Full of tense moments, anxiety, sweat, confusion, long lines, achy feet, and non-stop movement. But I’m here. I leave my mother at her hotel and walk back to my dorm in the dark at 10 at night. But don’t worry, I walked with a ballpoint pen in hand to stab an aggressor if necessary.
So I’m sorry if this was boring, nothing too humorous happened on the way over, just a lot of delays, but so goes traveling. However, do not fear, the next few days were quite ridiculous. My most favorite moment was pushing a big w shopping cart (full of bright pink accoutrements) the 10 blocks through the city from the mall to my dorm room. And one more thing, my television has 5 channels of basic television… news and thank goodness some reality television, but it has 5 more channels of security feed around the building. One at the front door, one in the common room, and 3 for elevator waiting areas. I can watch people fumble with their belongings searching for their card key to enter the building, wait for the elevator, or play ping pong downstairs. This is totally weird. But I’ve watched, don’t think I haven’t.
Thanks for reading, and I assure you my next blogs will have better stories, because I’ve been making quite a fool of myself. And I have a lot of questions. Maybe y’all can help me answer them.

I love and miss you all!