Day 5: Tuesday, March 18th

we both slept very well in our tents that had electricty with a fan and a lamp. my watch alarm kept going off at 4am, but we were getting up at 5 anyway, so oh well.

when we did wake up and get out of our tents, the stars were still out in all their glory and the milky way was big and bright.

so now we're off to walk through King's Canyon.

we had the option of a 3 hour walk or a 1 hour walk.

my sister and i were kinda getting tired of all this outback nonsense, so we chose the 1 hour walk and everyone else went on the 3 hour walk.

the first part of the 3 hour walk is called "Heart Attack Hill". it's so steep and high that there are 3 break areas along the way and i guess it causes heart attacks.

my sister and i did the first 1/3, and that was good enough for us.

we left our group and my sister and i went to head out for our 1 hour creek walk that goes through part of the canyon, whereas the 3 hour walk you go to the top and walk the rim of the canyon, walk down in it, then walk out of it again.

our creek walk was just fine. we climbed rocks, hugged trees, saw crazy bugs:

and took lots and lots of pictures.

then after our walk we went and read and napped on some picnic benches and waited for the rest of our group to meet up with us.

once they arrived, we went back to that resort that wasn't ours and used their picnic table and pool again. we ate our veggie burgers and that was where we ended our Outback trip! we hopped on a different tour bus that took us to Alice Springs (a 5 hour drive) while our original tour group had another night out there going to McDonell's Range or something? maybe it was McDonald's Farm.

Anyway, we were very ready to be finished. it was beautiful and educational and we were certainly happy we did it... but 3 days of hundreds of flies, of 100 degree weather, and of non-stop cultural walks around rocks... we were ready for something a bit different.

and we didn't find much in Alice Springs.

we had to spend a night there since there are a limited number of flights out of that city that is in the middle of nowhere. our tour bus dropped us off right in front of our hostel and we made plans with the tour guides and the group we just joined to meet up for dinner at 8pm.

oh, and on the bus ride home, i had to pee for the last 2 hours.

we got our room, i got to pee, and the room was huge. it was a "private family" room that had 3 twin beds and a full bed. my sister immediately grabbed the big bed. thanks. but we had a tv, clean sheets, ac, a private bathroom, and a couch.

i showered, my sister did laundry, then we sat down to watch "The Moment of Truth". is that what it is called? where contestants are asked "embarassing" questions while hooked up to a lie detector and we're all supposed to care about their lives. it's a horrible show. this one guy, well he said he had, yes, stolen from a business and let someone else take the blame. and when the machine said he was telling the truth, the audience cheered cause he didn't lie. but also.. he was a thief. do you cheer for that?

so then he wanted to explain himself: he was a teenager perhaps, and working at a concession stand and he was either over-charging people for hot dogs or charging people for things when they were free and keeping the extra money. and then the boss confronted the workers and said there was a thief among them, and he knew who it was, and then he pointed to a different guy. charlie took the fall for truth-telling guy!. and the audience laughed! what a funny anecdote! charlie's in jail, but i'm glad you explained yourself! now we'll clap even harder for you.

so, it was 7:55 and time to start to walk to the restaurant and we saw one of the tour guides in the lobby (Jane) and she was ironing some clothes and said they were running late and they would come by our room in 10 minutes to get us when they left so we could all walk over together.

so we went back to our room and at 8:13 realized no one had come by to get us yet, so we went out to the lobby. and no sign of jane or the other tour guide. we sat and waited til 8:27. and finally decided we had been left. what losers we are!

we were starving so we walked the 3 blocks to a pizza place for dinner. we put our order in, then thought we should find some forks and stuff at the neighboring k-mart. i knew we should have walked down the main road. you know, the big road with street lights on it, but my sister thought we could get through the back. so in the darkness of the night, through a scary and very poor town we walked down an alley, and then another alley, then finally got to the front of a closed k-mart. my sister insists i 'ran' during part of the darker and sketchier areas of her detour, but i was being alert and walking quickly because i didn't want to get attacked by the drunk man walking towards us. so we went back to the pizza shop and waited for at least 30 more minutes for our pizza and pasta. the employees kept leaving the store and not returning. eventually it was like one 15 year old kid doing everything.

well we got our food, headed back to the hostel, and found an elderly man practicing his violin, and a girl practicing for what seemed like ribbon dancing gymnastics in the front. we quickly walked by to go to our room to be normal and had a pizza party while watching 'kitchen nightmares' with gordon ramsey which is an awesome show.

then watched some horrible australia soap opera-like show: "life begins".

the son wanted to be in a boy band, but then he froze on stage. the mom was thinking of going to europe with another man. and employees were fighting over customers in a travel agent office. my sister loved it.

tomorrow we get to sleep in until 8am!! and we are soo excited. and i'm sure our pizza was better than that silly ole' restaurant with the tour group anyway!

Day 4: Monday, March 17th

happy st. patty's today! we celebrated by waking up at 5am.

my sister took a morning trip to the restroom and when she walked in, all the sinks were being used by middle-aged asian women. my sister was confused. did she go to the wrong bathroom?

so we made it to uluru at sunrise... oh, and saw it at 'twilight':















oh, and yesterday we saw this:
















anyway, we saw the sun rise over the big rock and it changed colors again. more
reds and oranges. but the FLIES! oh man, i haven't mentioned the flies. the flies are a force to be reckoned with in the outback. my sister and i kept tying sweaters and bandanas around our faces to act as a fly/mosquito net. and yes, they were there at sunrise. we actually waited a bit outside the truck watching the sunrise and the flies were so bad we watched the rest of it from inside the car. it was nice inside there.

then our tour guide said we had the option to climb Uluru or walk around the base of it. however, the Aboriginals really don't want people to climb up to the top of Uluru, because it's such a big part of many of their sacred rituals and history that even tho the Aboriginals can't tell us not to climb it, they really don't want us to, so none of us did.

when the Government decided to give the rock back to the Aboriginals or say that the Uluru/Kata Tjuta area was now a national park, in the deal they made with the Aboriginals, they said that they wanted to keep the Uluru Climb legal because they thought it they got ride of it, tourism would slow down. so even though this rock means a whole bunch to the native people of the land, and they had to have their land 'granted' back to them, and they don't want people climbing it because it takes away from their sacred traditions, the government said 'nope, we want money, so we will let people trample all over your big rock'.

so don't climb it.

but you can walk around it. and man... no matter what side you see this thing from... it's still a big rock. it was at least a 2 hour walk... just to walk around this thing. we were pretty done looking at the outback about 1/3 of the way into the walk... but we completed it, and we touched it. we were allowed, don't worry.

then after the 'base walk' we had another darn walk. this was a more guided walk to a certain part of the base of Uluru where we learned about the types of activities and ceremonies that used to go on there. like here:


that's Wave Cave. yep, it's carved into the base of uluru. story goes: it was made by a giant mole that was lonely and wanted the Mala people to stay and live there. i'm not lying.

well, the Mala people didn't live there, but they used it as part of the process for boys becoming men. boys in small groups would sit there alone for weeks and weeks in order to become men in their society. then there's this long story about an evil spirit being sent over to Uluru when the Mala people were in the middle of several ceremonies at the rock and the Mala people ran away and left 4 of their boys in the wave cave... and they waited forever... and now they are part of the cave. see those 'bumps' (2 1/2 in this photo)... well, there are 4 in the cave, and those are supposed to be the 4 boys left behind.


in conclusion, the rock is big, and red, and big.


then we had lunchies and my sister's entry for today was "at lunch we decided we didn't like the other American in the group because she talks TOO MUCH and we DON'T CARE. then we had popsicles."

next up was a 4 hour car ride to King's Canyon. it wasn't too bad. my sister and i played gin, slept, and at all the rest stops we visited, each had different Australian animals. so we got lots of pictures of camels and kangaroos and later emus.

when we first got to the King's Canyon area, we stopped at a different resort... a place we eren't going to stay at, but we used their picnic tables and pool. i still don't know why. and after i got pulled into the pool by our tour guide, we were able to take nice showers there.

then we were off to our actual camping area... which was up this large hill and down a long bumpy dirt road. AND we saw a dingo. a real live wild dingo. and it was not eating a baby.















when we got to our camp area we put some chairs in the center, and we all talked a bit and shared photos from the trip thus far waiting for dinner to be cooked.

oh, and we learned what everyone calls McDonald's in their home country

America: Mickey D's
Australia: Macka's
Switzerland: Mack's
Belgium: Mickey's

the dinner was good and my sister and i headed to bed while everyone else slept in sleeping bags outside to sleep under the stars. oh, we saw the Southern Cross and Orion's belt, and we could see a satellite passing overhead because the sky was so clear.

walking around rocks make us tired.

Day 3: Sunday, March 16th

so we left Sydney really early, so early that people were coming home (incredily drunk, loud, and annoying) when we were trying to check out. they also almost broke the 1 elevator in the hostel. if you stand in the doorway of an elevator, the doors won't close. thought it was a simple thing to understand, but apparently not always.

so we got the train (at the train station "30 meters" from our hostel), and it was sketchy. the stations and platforms were almost empty, except for creepy guys... and us. then we had to switch trains at central station, but our train wasn't running. so we had to find our way through a maze of halls and stairs to find this magical bus that took us to the airport.

when we got off, all the other airport-destined bus-riders started walking to the same terminal as i started walking to another terminal. you see, there was this sign that said our flight number was in terminal 2, my sister said we should follow the group of people to terminal 1 because they must know what they were doing. we get to terminal 1, and our plane is leaving out of terminal 2. please note, this is just the beginning of situations to follow where my sister did not listen to me, and i was in fact right all along.

so, we got our plane out to Uluru (Ayer's Rock). i slept for most of the 3 hour trip and my sister got sucked into the in-flight movie: August Rush. she knew it was gonna be bad. she knew she hadn't already seen it for a reason. yet she decided to plug her headphones in and watch. and from what i heard, it was terrible.

we found our free shuttle to the Ayer's Rock Resort area. we had a few hours to kill before our tour bus was coming to pick us up, so we found a little grocery store and bought stuff for lunch, some awesome aussie outback hats, and playing cards. but not normal playing cards, JUMBO CARDS. and 1 butter knife. for our cheese. so we had ourselves a lil picnic

we still had an hour or so to wait and we layed down for a bit in one of the lobbies of one of the hotels with other waiting tourists. and they had on a lot of ugly clothes. which my sister talked about loudly, claiming everyone around didn't speak english so it didn't matter.

our Safari Tour 4WD finally came and we were taken to our campsite

to meet up with the rest of our tour group. there were 2 nice girls from Sweden, 1 guy from Tahiti, a mom and dad with their teenage son from Belgium, and an annoying american girl from California. she told grrrrrrrrrrreat stories. ("i have a friend who calls me when he's drunk. no really, it's funny. he leaves me these messages that i can't understand. it's because he's drunk!...... i should call him")

it was too hot to do the scheduled Valley of the Winds walk, so we did a shorter walk through Kata Tjuta (the Olgas). (a neighboring tourist rock site of Uluru)

we took lots of pictures. a lot.

then back to Uluru for the sunset. the tour group provided snacks and champagne. my sister and i had our own bowl of cheese. the other cheese was on a meat platter. we had a meat-free cheese bowl. and it was good. but we saw Uluru at sunset and it was beautiful, the rock really does seem to change colors. well, not like to green and fuschia, but more like orange, to red, to brown, to black.... because the sun has set.

on the drive back to our campsite our tour guide played YMCA, Car Wash, Macarena, Grease Lightning, and etc and my sister and i showed the rest of the group how to get down with their bad selves. or, we just danced in the car and they all rolled their eyes.

then we showered and passed out!!

We have to wake up tomorrow at 5am to beat the sun so we can see uluru at sunrise. must see uluru at all times apparently. we must.

Day 2: Saturday, March 15th

so i didn't wait for my sister for too long at the sydney airport. she came through customs at about 10:40 and we went straight to the train station to get our one-way tickets to the city to our hostel.

my sister coughed most of the way home on the train, looking very ill, sweating, but still alive and in 1 piece.

our hostel directions said they were located 30 meters from the train station. so after walking in the wrong direction for 4 blocks, we finally asked a Hilton hotel valet guy where the "Star Bar" was, knowing it was close to our hostel.

after walking several blocks in the right direction (much more than just 30 little meters) we found our "street". which was more of an alley really. we were greeted by a slow and easily confused front desk guy. it took him a while to get things going. in the meantime, we heard another guest happily tell another guy "yeah man! tomorrow i move to the 3rd floor! i'm moving on up! i'm back again!". i think these guys have stayed here for a while.

my sister and i eventually got our key (on the 1st floor. far away from the emphatic guest). and were told we could come back down "if we wanted to" to get our linens and towels. why yes, we do thank you.

my sister showered, and i made the beds. we watched 'beverly hills cop" and took a quick run out to a convenience store to get some juice, water, and crackers. we returned home, next to a neighboring restaurant where the menu was written in "asian" to quickly fall asleep.

my sister coughed during most of the night and i had a bad dream about fighting in a war and watching a friend get shot in the chest in slo-mo that made me wake up choking on air.

@ about 5am someone cleaned the bathrooms very loudly. and since the walls are thin, you can definitely hear when anyone enters or exits their room. the night was a bit rough.

but we got up at 9:30, took our time getting ready for the day, and headed out a bit after 10.

we walked to Hyde Park. my sister took some pics, we saw the hyde park fountain, and then headed towards Circular Quay (the harbour). we walked by the ferry docks, saw some Aboriginals playing the didgeridoo, and walked along until we reached the Opera House. my sister was feeling a bit faint so we sat down, took some pics, then found a little italian cafe on the harbor and had a margherita pizza, garlic bread, and some really bad sugary cranberry juice.

my sister judged the passer-bys as "hot, hot mess, tranny, tranny mess, fierce" and so on. most were tranny messes. except for the elderly ladies. they were mainly fierce.

so next we were off to ride the ferry around the "inner harbour". while waiting for our ferry we made the best purchase of our lives. we found awesome "Rock Star style" sunglasses which of course we rocked on our harbour bridge climb.

on our ferry ride we saw luna park, goat island, darling harbour, the maritime museum, and then returned back to circular quay.



next we walked over to The Rocks to find the sydney harbour bridge climb headquarters. on the way we saw Bendy Em's street show of contortionistic amazement! she did crazy things with her body and as a finale, she stuffed herself in a 16" box on a small scaffold. the audience assistant she chose to help her she nicknamed "Boo".

we stopped by the information office to find maps, a restroom, air conditioning, and 15 minutes of cheap internet access. we walked by street vendors selling corn, jewelry, australian pennies, "space art", shark teeth, and etc. my sister didn't want any of it. what the hell?

so on to the the sydney harbour bridge climb:
from start to end, took a little over 3 hours, but i think it was worth it.

the waiting area had a silent promo video on loop where my sister generously added the dialogue "i love suits. BRIDGES! i love suits"

then our whole climb group passed an alochol breath test. then we all got our suits on, locked up our valuables, then got our climbing gear clipped on.

we did an indoor "simulation" (just like a real bridge!) to make sure we could all climb stairs.

we got headsets, my sister got some personally delivered water since she was dying of a cough, and we headed on out.

we were 2nd and 3rd in line behind a very nice young UK girl. she was heading over to New Zealand for her sister's wedding.

our tour guide was very nice and the whole experience was awesome.

hard to believe we were on top of a bridge, over 40 stories high.

on the way down, my sister's and my legs were shaking and my heels were in pain for hours afterwards, but we made it.

supposedly we burned 800 calories, but all i know is we got a lot of sun exposure.
it was fun.

we bought pictures they took of us on top of the bridge and we hurried off to Wagamama which we knew was one block away from our hostel for some good din-din.

on our way out from the bridge climb headquarters, my sister heard a man speaking to his wife about their own bridge climb pictures: "why do you always have to put your hand on my gut?!"

it's now 9:30pm and we are in our bunkbeds watching "terminator 2: judgment day"

tomorrow we wake up at 5:30am for our 8:15am flight to Uluru. hooray!!

The Trip Begins!

my sister went home this morning after a busy and exciting trip around australia. however, we kept a diary of our trip throughout the whole adventure, so i thought i would, day by day, post each entry here.

so for the next 12ish days, i'll have a brand new post! so here it comes!!

DAY 1 Friday, March 14th
My sister is arriving tonite. since she had to move her arrival date, she comes in a day earlier. today i just spent tying up some loose ends, relaxing, and of course cleaning. since my sister will be seeing my dorm room at the end of the trip, i thought i should tidy up, at least a little bit. as usual, my room looks like a tornado came through here, so i tried to neaten it as much as possible. i even vacuumed!

now i'm at the canberra airport waitng for my plane to leave to sydney. my flight is running 5 mins late, and before i left, i checked Flightstats.com and my sister's flight left 41 mins late and 35 minutes behind schedule. so while i arrive at 9:05, she'll arrive at 10.
oh, and i was bomb tested, again, at the canberra airport. i get asked every single time. oh, and the airport calls itself an international one, even tho 'currently' there are no incoming or outgoing international flight, so how can it pull that off??
anyway, i'm always bomb tested at this airport because there's never anyone in the security line and so the bomb testers must get bored and take anyone that comes through.

so now i'm in sydney. i'm waiting in the arrivals greeting area. it's 9:50 and my sister's flight is due at 10:07. the original arrival time was 9:20pm.

however, on my canberra flight, with all the empty seats in the whole dang plane, the one next to me was filled. filled by a 19 year old boy named Conor.
overly zealous to talk to me, i humored him for a bit at first, but then we both finally resigned ourselves to our books.

however... the conversation was interesting. i learned he was discharged from the army for doing coke.
conor: 'i was kicked out of the army for doing cocaine'
me (being deaf): kicked out from where?
conor: COKE
me: no no, kicked out of what?
conor: COCAINE!!
me: no, what were you kicked out of?
conor: COOOOOOOOOKE
me: ok, start that sentence all over
conor: i was kicked out of the army...
me: THAT! that was what i wanted to know.

so after yelling 'cocaine' out multiple times, i decided i didn't want to talk to him anymore.
oh, but his brother is straight-edge and wants to be a cop so they don't get along.
and he also interrupted his own brotherly-love story to tell me i had beautiful eyes.

i'm glad i had a book.

to be continued....

*SPOILER ALERT*
my sister arrived safely.

Never On Time

Well, this trip my sister and I are taking is starting off just swell.

i've been sick for a week.
she awoke today (wednesday) to a fever.
she thought she was leaving saturday.
i thought she was arriving on saturday.
American Airlines can't write an itinerary correctly.

therefor(e?), we had a bit of a panic today.

her flight, in fact, was to arrive on monday.
pushing out itinerary back by 2 days.
leaving us $3,000 dollars in the hole, considering the flights, tour packages, and hostel payments were all non-refundable.

what to do... what to do...

after 40 frantic minutes of brainstorming, and talking to the travel agent, and using all my phone credit on international calls to my sister...

she ended up just changing her departure date in order to get to australia in time to start my pre-planned, pre-paid itinerary.

instead of her having 55 hours to pack and prepare, she now had 8. and still a fever.

but it's ok now! i think. she's on her way.
i'll be getting a good night's sleep. she'll be getting a good 17 hours in the air. and then we'll meet and start our adventure!

here we come australia!

Thank You Canberra

My sister is coming to visit!
and i have quite an itinerary set out for us.

We begin with 1 day in sydney where we are going to "climb the bridge". the harbour bridge. and we're going straight to the top!

then we're off to the Red Center. we're going to see Uluru (Ayer's Rock), King's Canyon, and some Olgas? Don't know, but heard it's pretty. And we'll be "camping" in the actual outback.

next we have a stop over in Brisbane. I'm sure we'll find something to do there.

Then off to the Great Barrier Reef for 4 days! Relaxation, sun, swimming, and sailing.. and the reef!

Lastly we'll come to Canberra and go hot air ballooning! and she can meet my friends!

I'm so excited!

however... i'm sick. my immune system hates me and i woke up 2 days ago feeling horrible. i've been popping pills, juice, and soup and sleeping in between. oh, and overdosing on West Wing.

i'm going to will myself to be better by saturday when my adventure begins with my sister.

buuuut, today is Canberra Day! Yes, an actual government-approved Australian holiday. I think we're supposed to sit around and discuss why we love canberra. My friends are having a "barbie" (bbq) in an hour or so. i'll probably be napping. because there's only one way to say thank you to Canberra: grill up some kangaroo and sausages. we love you canberra, so we will eat your meat.

i did however do dishes and laundry today. So I would like to thank Canberra for the running water and electricity so i can keep tabs on my hygiene.

and i hope all the folks playing along at home pay homage to Canberra in his or her own way.
for example you could:
have bloody hot weather.
take measurements in metres.
say "bloke" a heap.
pretend you care about the Queen.
take your temperature in celsius then try to convert that to fahrenheit to realize you have a slight temperature.... maybe.
refuse to use the penny.
and much much more.

let me know how it's goes!

Don't Eat the Veggie Balls

yes, i do have an office. it's a room i share with 2 other post-grad students. 1 i knew from last year, so it should be fun. i have a window that overlooks a courtyard. i have a computer. internet. lockable filing cabinets. shelving. and spider webs.

so the guys here have started a cricket team for our dorm to compete in intra-hall sports. just games against the other dorms here. sunday was their first game. and it was awesome. they lost. but that's ok. a bunch of us went out there for support, and it was great actually watching a cricket game. yeah, it was about 103 degrees. but we had grapes, and water, and gossip magazines, and music, and towels to lay down on, and sure, we watched some of the cricket game here and there.
there's still plenty about the game i don't understand: no bowls, extra bowls, leg before wickets, the random yelling the players do, and strategy as a whole really. but there were some great plays out there, and even tho they lost by about 70 runs, it was fun. and it lasted 6 hours.
however, when the defensive team does get someone on the other team out, everyone on the field runs to the middle screaming and jumping and they all high-five. it's awesome. that's how they even do it professionally.
the best part: a few of my friends got the sunglass tan on their faces. now we call them raccoon and possum. i got away with some red shins. not too bad.

now things are finally getting back to normal. everyone has started classes again and i'm basically just reading here and there and visiting my office every once and a while. i did manage to lose my camera battery and my debit card in one evening. and i didn't use either that nite... interesting... but i've already sent off to have both replaced.

i don't have much to report... except i'm going a little crazy trying to plan the trip for when my sister visits in just 2 weeks!! i want to see Uluru and the Great Barrier Reef... but i think these packaged trips are gonna cost us quite a bit. my plan: go into the travel agency geared toward students and have them plan it all out for me. i don't like making decisions.

i did however make some Veggie Balls from a recipe book i got for xmas just for microwaveable vegetarian recipes... and they were quite gross. tonite i'm making some stuffed squash. i hope it's better.