Best. Day. Ever. Again.

As I'm nearing my near 1 month anniversary of being in Australia it is definitely bitter sweet. I feel as if I'm falling deeper in love with Australia everyday however little things are starting to remind me of home and all of the friends that I am missing and how close I am to having to make "big kid" decisions..yikes! This past week is definitely what I would describe as my ideal Aussie week due to the numerous activities and the ability to step it down a notch as school is starting to pick up.
 I can honestly say that I attended every single one of my classes this week.. except for one but oh well close enough. The way of teaching here is absolutely phenomenal and I think I've retained more in my first few weeks of lectures then I did all last year. The class sizes are smaller and they definitely make the material more applicable to everyday life so it really gets ingrained. The only difficult part of my bioenergetics class is the professors hybrid aussie/french accent that makes words like 'protein' come out 'praw-teen' and tropomyosin come out something that I can't even figure out the phonetics for. But ultimately it makes class way more interesting and keeps you engaged while he's using his stuffed snake he brought to class to demonstrate 'prawteen' folding. I also attended my Sport and Spirituality lecture and tutorial for the first time this week and was blown away. The lecture material itself was rather dry and boring but I had an epiphany in class when we discussed how "life is something that happens after you realize you're inevitably marked for death". It really just kind of all clicks and makes you realize that there's no chance in fighting it really, you're number is already up at some point so you might as well just give up on worrying about things that can't be changed and as cliche as it sounds, live life to the fullest. It's made me kind of put off the idea of nursing school in the fall as I would really like to take the year off and just get up and go. Thanks to a lot of help from Jena Sprau I've been looking into teaching english in South Korea for a year. It seems like the most amazing opportunity and when else will I be able to fully explore Asia? I still plan on applying for nursing schools as a back up plan and just to keep options open, but I plan on throwing a few applications towards Teach for America and also a non-profit group up in Appalachia that I did work with over spring break a few years ago. I figure I have the rest of my life to go to school and work full time, whats the rush? This is the only time when it's socially acceptable to just drop everything and leave. I plan on taking full advantage of it :)
  And this is where slight homesickness starts to kick in. One month in, only 3 more to go. It's so bizarre feeling as if the last thing I want to do is leave here but also I miss my friends back home. It also throws another blow to realize that I when I get back everything will be so different. Thursday night euchre nights and grilling out with Doug, Jesse, and Cole will now be a thing of the past as they all booked it up to Carbondale for school. Amanda and I will have own apartment in Urbana which I'm super pumped for, however it definitely won't be the same without Aly and Sarah and it's weird to think this is the last time Amanda and I will live together. I miss waking up to having random people crashing on our couch, the apartment being in complete shreds, and no one having a clue how our coffee table ended up in 2 pieces. One of the things I'm going to miss most is Summer Sports Fitness Camp with all my best friends. Working with your best friends makes all the difference I could not imagine a worse/better job. There's no way I would've made it through without Sarah  and the cases of beer we have to go through to make it through the summer sane and in one piece. Then there's Stevo. The highlight of everyday during the summer was working the 10 hour days (that feel like 27hrs) and coming home to have a beer on the balcony, throw on some Cage the Elephant, and just mellow out and spill our highlights from the day. This will also be different when I get back seeing as he now has a new roommate (traitor) and neither of us have balconies at our new place. One of my favorite summer memories include when a fire spontaneously combusted in the grill, and yes I realize that's what grills are for, but this a fire of mass proportions that set off the fire alarms in the whole building, also there was the night that we accidentally spilled a huge mug filled with red wine all over his down comforter while watching a movie in the apartment "theater room" aka Aly's old room. I have never seen anyone jump up so fast and the stain actually came out thanks to an immediate washing. Epic Fail. I also miss my mom something fierce. It's great to hear from her about all the updates on moving everyone into the house is going but I wish I could be there to help. I also missed my (hardly) little sister's first day of high school which was tough but I'm sure she won't be suspended or expelled by the time I get back and we can re-enact the moment.
  Enough of the sappy stuff, back to the positive! These past two weeks have been so hectic but so amazing as usual! Last Friday we took off early to go to John Forrest National Park for the day and the mission of the whole trip was the 1) See a wild kangaroo and 2) grill some sausages on the barbie. We had read somewhere that there was an $11 admission fee and all of us are a little on the broke side as can be expected. So our genius idea was to have the bus driver drop us off a little down the road and just walk into the forest there as opposed to through the entrance where we might be slapped with an admission fee and a bag search. So we proceeded to get a little lost but ultimately it was the best. day. ever. We started by following a few tails then ended up being adventurous and just doing extremely "bush walking". On our travels we found an abandoned car, in the middle of the bush, surrounded by lots of trees and shit. We have no idea how it got there, but it looked like it'd been there for awhile so, naturally, we smashed the windshield and popped the trunk to look for dead bodies.. no such luck, still a great find though!

Train ride in, everyone clearly super pumped

awesome random car in the middle of the nowhere

Maria trying to figure out how to pop the trunk  so we can check for dead bodies

We eventually found our way back to the main road through the park and followed it until we found some awesome rocks to go climb on. About 3 hours in we were starting to get a little disappointed that we hadnt seen any kangaroos or eaten anything seeing as there were no grills just chillin in the middle of the bush. Our friend John was also extremely disappointed that the national park not only had spiders, but wasn't just some big open grassy field to play football in.. he didnt quite grasp the concept of going bush-walking, in an Australian national park.. but we all had a great time regardless. After walking around for about 5 hours we finally found our way back towards the entrance of the park and it was then that magic struck and we found the "recreation area" that had picnic tables, grills, and lots of wide open space for activities. We were quite amused to find out that if we would have just gone through the entrance like normal people, there is only a fee per car (which we didnt have) and that the rec area was literally about 200m past the entrance. They have these great free gas grills to use in parks just so people don't bring their own or burn down the whole forrest so we made sausages (they dont have hot dogs here) and were astounded to see our first wild roo, and then agitated when the guys that made a stop at the tav said there were like 6 roos just hanging around up there. So we ate then headed up to the tav (yes a bar at a national park, amazing concept) and it was there that we saw a whole group of kangaroos just hanging out and being incredibly cute.. definitely going to bring one of those back with me!

not the greatest group effort on the picture, but the park was absolutely gorgeous

Chef Anders on the grill

All the wild roos just hanging out at the tav

 But we stayed at the tav til it was almost time to catch our bus, by this point it was pitch dark out and if we missed our bus it would be another hour before the next one back. Our bus was supposed to pick us up literally on the side of a highway that had no street lights whatsoever, at least 30 mins outside of town, and there's only a small little post marking the spot. When walking up we thought we saw our bus driving by which resulted in a full out sprint to try and catch it, only to realize it wasn't our bus afterall. So then it just turned into a waiting game which turned into one big hypothetical situation of who would get murdered first, I was voted the first to go being the only blonde chick...so great to know. After finally catching the bus, it was about a 30 min ride to the train station where we had to catch a 30-40min train which ended up being one of the most entertaining parts of the whole night. The Aborigine population here is rarely seen in town from my understanding and according to everyone else, when they are in town they are most likely drunk. They have quite the reputation for being violent drunks so we were all quite interested when a clearly drunk Aborigine man, whose name we found out after a guessing game is Nathan, stumbled onto the train as we're all on the verge of exhaustion. He kept us entertained the whole way home as he found out all of the girl's names, asked us where we're all from, licked his lips as he looked at my legs, asked about whether Lindsey and I played sports as he was staring right at our chests, and then proceeded to pull a gram out of his coat pocket to offer to Anders who happens to have dreads to see if he wants it seeing as it looks as if he smokes quite the reefer. It was definitely entertaining and I had tears in my eyes most of the way home from laughing so hard.

Cottlesloe Beach 

Tav along the beach aka my dream home

  The  next day was Will's 21st birthday which meant absolutely nothing to him because in England the drinking age is like 12 and here in Australia its 18 so to him it was just another birthday but we made sure to make it a big deal. The guys were all supposed to get surfing lessons in the morning but ended up missing those by getting lost and looking everywhere but the beach for the people that were supposed to be giving them the lessons. So we just ended up making it one big beach day which was amazing. The waves at Cottesloe are gigantic! It's still technically winter here until about the end of November but we all got in the water, which was freezing I might add, and had the time of our lives. The water is super super salty so as soon as we got out you just feel the salt dried to your body. But who else gets to say they went swimming in the ocean in the middle of winter? We ended up staying there for the whole afternoon and we met up with a bunch of other international students that were there and they tried to teach us a little bit of English football and Australian football. After that me and a girl from Canada tried teaching them all how to play American football, once again.. epic fail. We were able to play a few games of it but they quickly got confused and bored and we resorted to soccer. We also found the local tav and had a pint of pear cider which was absolutely delicious and quite possibly one of my new favorites.

Will with his birthday cake :)

   After spending the day at the beach we went back to the Leeds boys' house (the three guys from Leeds Uni  in the UK) to continue with the festivities. We had made Will a birthday cake earlier and got him a cheesy Australian flag that all of us had so 'sincerely' signed. We made some more sausages and some pasta (pronounced 'pah-sta') which got used to make pah-sta toasties the next morning for breakfast. (pah-sta toastie: grilled cheese only with pasta in the middle.. not as good as it might sound). The guys' house is your typical male dwelling. All the furniture in the place was found along the side of the road. It's actually quite impressive really, they have 2 leather couches, a few shitty but nice chairs, beds, mattresses, dressers, a microwave, glasses, pots and pans. In exchange for letting all of us crash at their place all the time we're supposed to help with the cleaning which is a task no one is really daring enough to do but it makes for some really great memories. We ended up finally making it out the bars Saturday night with that being the first time all of us actually made it into a bar together. They're really really strict at the bars here. If you look like you've had too much you get instantly denied, you have to have close toed nice shoes on, if they don't think you're dressed up enough you get the boot which sucks for me since I usually just wear jeans and chucks everywhere. They usually just pull that card with the guys though as you can imagine. A lot of places, especially in the North Bridge area of Perth take your picture upon entering that way if you get in a fight later they can not only permanently ban you but the cops know your name and all your details. They also have iris scanners and fingerprint scanners here just to keep tabs on everyone. If you go the bar and they think you've had too much they'll just give you water and say nothing more. Saturday night we all somehow got in but Tom managed to get asked to leave when he was just standing around doing nothing, fortunately he walked out and to the end of the line and came right back in again.. bizarre. But overall it was a great night. The guys live quite a ways from the city so we had to take a taxi to and from and it costs about $30/car each way. The taxis here are super strict on only 4 people to a car, there's none of the campus awesomeness of fitting like 9 people in a  car so it's only $2/person.

Shmanda and I 

After a long day at the beach and bars on the roadside mattresses

   Also, everything here closes super super early which includes public transit. There are next to no buses or trains running on the weekends, especially at night which blows my mind. Businesses and shops also close super early and most aren't open at all on Sundays. It makes it really eerie at night walking home because literally nothings open and they don't believe in street lights here. Fortunately Perth feels deserted about 90% of the time so I'm getting used to it. Another weird thing here is the lack of a dollar menu at Mcdonalds! Outrageous... and they call McDonalds "Maccas' (mack-ahs) here so if anyone ever wants to go for a Macca's run.. it's going to be at least $4 for anything.
 This past week we ventured out to the movies finally and we saw Planet of the Apes.. super good! On Tuesdays they have $9 movies which is cheap here for them. They were talking on the news the other night how it now costs about $65 for a family of 4 to go to the movies here, yikes! We decided last minute on Tuesday to go while all of us were at uni and the movie didn't start until 8:30pm so we had some extra time on our hands. Josef, Maria and I were at the tav waiting to go until we remembered that it closes at 6 so we all drank a pitcher and went to Maria's forensic night class.. super interesting actually I think I'm going to start going to her classes with her every week! Then we took a train into the city and stocked up on sweets such as TimTams and gummy bears and went to Maccas. TimTams are the most amazing cookies ever and super popular here, we pretty much bring them everywhere now and usually don't show up at the beach without them. But the movie theater we went to here which is right in the middle of downtown Perth was soo small. It was about 8 seats across and only about 13 rows but it was a really cool experience. Way better than the huge stadium size theaters in the US.
  Next up on the To Do List for the day is to go into Uni to start planning our spring break while we're here. Initially we were thinking Bali but I think we're going to opt for a huge road trip up the West Coast heading north. The distance we're planning on travelling over the course of 10 days is the equivalant of driving from Chicago to LA so it should be quite the experience. We're planning on stopping at Monkey Mia and Karijini and a few other places on the way to stop and camp. Along the way up the coast there's places to stop and see the reefs, dolphins, humpback whales, whale sharks, and so many other cool attractions! Right now we're looking at about a group of 7 going so we're thinking either a minivan or 2 small cars and just going for it. Unfortunately for the rest of mankind I have to drive for quite a bit of it seeing as I'm 21 and have a license. Apparently in England it's not a big deal not to have one so people's lives may be at stake during my driving shifts, this whole drive on the other side of the road and the car thing is tricky! But we've also been warned several times to do absolutely no driving whatsoever around dusk because that's when all the roos are active and will really mess up your car. We thought people were joking with us at first but after talking to Ed and Cathering (the host parents :)) last night they pretty much assured me that especially where we'll be driving through that we really should do absolutely no driving at dusk or even at dusk for that matter so we'll see how that goes!
  Also tonight, we all got tickets to see the final AFL game of the season so I'm super pumped! AFL is absolutely like no other game I've seen and although I've been trying to watch bits and pieces to get ready for tonight I still have generally no clue whats going on but it should be fun! It's a mix of American football and soccer, rugby and a few other things I can't quite put my finger on. But it should be a great time and I'm super pumped! Also coming up is Lindsey's birthday so all of us girls are going to take surfing lessons which hopefully don't end tragically.
  But hopefully I can write again sooner next time so it's not another novel, but here you go mom! Feast your eyes! Love you so much and miss you!!

 PS- please send tomato soup.. don't know how much longer I can last!

When International Drinking Forces Unite

 
 So as week three of officially living down under wraps up I have yet again come to some notice some very important points: 1) Uni (college) here is amazing. 2) Inventive drinking games will exist in any culture and 3) if any stranger asks, I am now from Canada.
  First things first, of course the only reason I'm here... school! ha! I really did try to make a valiant effort to attend most of my classes the first week of school but let's be honest, everyone knows that the first week of school, regardless of culture, is syllabus week in which attendance is optional at best. For the classes I did attend, I was pleasantly surprised not to see a single T.A. and I don't have a class larger than 100! I also have a lab that has a whopping 7 kids in it.. the only time you would see that at the U of I is if the T.A.s go on strike and/or Unofficial. I was slightly discouraged to see that despite the fact that I'm taking mainly health science classes while I'm here, everyone and their mom dresses up to come to school. Girls and guys alike. I look even more like a bum than usual.. so depressing. But oh well, I guess I won't take it personally that the guys here probably spend more time on their wardrobe than I do.. it just makes them that much cuter ;) I was initially pretty scared of my courseload while I'm here but it turns out that I have a rocking schedule (4 day weekends!), my professor for Bioenergetics is absolutely amazing, the class that will fill my 400 level Kines requirement at home is IDENTICAL to a class I just took at the U of I last semester so I already know all the material and the prof rocks, my Anthro Psych class is actually pretty interesting, and I'll let ya know about my other class.. I may or may not have accidentally missed it.. 2 weeks in a row.. oh well, I'm trying to play the international card as long as possible :)
  Now for the real reason I'm here, the people! These past few weeks have definitely been a great mix of friends and family. I have made some amazing friends from all over the place, with a dominant force coming from the UK. A lot of us are commuters to school however and chose to do random housing options all over the place so generally when we go out its safe to assume that we won't be making it home and that we honestly don't know where we're staying. This leads to a lot of floor sleeping and a lot of walk-of-shaming it home in the same clothes from the night before but ultimately some great great memories, however blurry they might be :) The drinking games that result from a room full of international students compiling all the rules is absolutely phenomenal. Last night was the Geeks and Freaks pub crawl which was absolutely amazing. After Maria, Jos, Will, John, and I went exploring the local Salvo (Salvation Army) we went all out which made for some interesting looks when we all arrived separately by bus and train to meet at the pub. I also had the opportunity to go to a tupperware party the night before with my amazing host mum, Catherine, and have an organic soaps and hygienics party tomorrow morning fully equipped with tea and scones. I think it's fair to say I have accrued a nice balance of uni friends as well as the 40+ crowd :)

                                         

                                               -Me and Lindsey rocking our geek gear

                                               - Aaron and Hazel helping to make scones :)
 Now, last but not least. For all travel intensive purposes, I am Canadian. I rely on the bus and train practically everyday for travel so that makes for quite the commute and quite the increased incident rate to talk to people. Generally I LOVE talking to random people and gaining lots of tid bits of info and really just love the company. However, it never fails, as soon as someone starts talking to me they instantly want to know when I'm from. Naturally, I say Chicago because who the hell knows where Champaign is? The next 5-10 minutes are almost guaranteed to be filled with the first question of "how do you like it here so far" followed by something along the lines of "so you guys are pretty fucked up over there, eh?". One guy I met on the bus carried on for about 5 minutes telling me how ignorant Americans are, it's our fault we're so broke and thought we were strong enough to go through 2 wars within a 10 year period, we're ruthless for denying people chemo due to lack of health insurance, and our work force is treated like shit based on our low minimum wage and lack of holidays. After this five minute period of tearing down my homeland, he proceeded to ask me out to dinner sometime.. naturally I wrote down a random 10 digit number and flipped him the bird while exiting the bus. Unfortunately, convos such as these happen on a quite frequently. As soon as my accent gives away that I'm American, a comment regarding Bush's idiocracy, our extreme debt, or a question asking what I think about Obama is soon to follow. I don't like talking about Obama in the states, and I def don't like talking about him here. For some reason, people assume that I was the one that decided to drive the nation into debt and I single handedly elected Obama and advised him to go against all his empty promises. I have found that the best way to prevent situations such as these is to wear head phones at all times (unless a cute Aussie wanders my way) or to simply ask them how they feel about the Carbon Tax that's about to imposed here. My next game plan is to claim Canadian heritage and hope for the best. It is most certainly not the case that everyone here is like that. For the most part everyone here has been so welcoming, so utterly amazing words can't describe. But of course, every now and then you get stuck to someone on the bus that wants to inform you how they'll never fly domestically in the US due to a documentary they saw here about how all US pilots make $12,000 so surely can't be trusted with our safety.
 But that's my rant of the day.. So far the time here has been absolutely amazing and I can't to see whats in store :)

PS- Mom I miss you! Please send soup...