Melbourne and The Great Ocean Road

For the first of our two consecutive Monday holidays, a few of my friend's and I were trying to plan a trip. And, since the first day of classes, a Tuesday, would have a Monday timetable, most of us weren't going to have class until Wednesday. Put it all together and you have a 5 day weekend in the middle of the semester.

Originally, we were thinking of camping at Fraser Island, since that was once place that we were all told to visit before we left Australia. But we soon realized that since it was a public holiday and some people had already been there, that we should go somewhere else. Conveniently, the other masses of French people had planned a trip to Melbourne and The Great Ocean Road for this weekend about 1.5 months ago. So, the previous weekend, we made a few phone calls and decided to go along with them. And, due to a mix-up in ordering the plane tickets, there was an additional ticket available. We found some one to take the ticket - another Frenchman - bringing the group total to 17.

We arrived intermittently to Melbourne as the weekend started. Some came on Thursday night and slept in the airport, I came by myself on Friday night, and the rest of the group showed up Saturday morning at around 2:30am. I didn't mind flying by myself and the Aussie girls sitting next to me were nice enough to sing Happy Birthday at midnight when we were sitting on the tarmac. Once I had gotten my bags and got in a long line to bus a bus ticket to the city, I asked the people behind me if they wanted to catch a cab instead. They, Guillame and Benedicte, agreed. Oddly enough, they were also French and working in Brisbane. When I got to my hostel, my friends were out and I couldn't get a hold of them, so I just walked around until going to sleep.

The next day was my birthday and the hostel that we stayed at had a pretty good internet connection and webcams on their computers, so I had a Skype conversation with Mom, Dad, Mark, and Nate back home - my first encounter with Milwaukee for the weekend. The rest of the day was spent walking around and soaking in the sights of Melbourne. We quickly realized that there were tons of things for us to do and see, so we did our best to hit some of the highlights. It helped that we broke up into small groups and picked a meeting place for lunch, but we still needed 2 or 3 days more before we could see everything that was on our list. So we saw some old Parliament buildings, gardens, shops, and other old houses and then met up to eat Sushi for lunch at Federation Square. From there, we walked to the Botanical Gardens and ANZAC Memorial. It wasn't a very long walk, but I was wearing the new shoes that I had purchased from the Queen Victoria Market that morning and they were giving me horrible blisters, so I went shoeless for the rest of the day.

The Botanical Gardens were really nice, but everyone was falling asleep except myself and a few others for an assortment of reasons. Since I wanted to see more of the gardens and I also had planned to see one of Nate's old teammates, Shae McNamara, play at Victoria park in his VFL game, I left the big group and did my own thing.

I basically ran through the gardens and across town, asking for directions along the way, to get the nearest train station. I had planned to see the last hour of Shae's game since his girlfriend told me that they usually last for about 2.5 hours when I called his phone. By the time I got to the train, I was glad to see that I would make it with about half an hour left to play. I got the train that I needed and then absentmindedly got off at the stop after Victoria Park. So I walked around to the other platform and waited 10 minutes for the return train. The train came, as scheduled, and took me all the way back to the station that I just came from. Why? Well, it was an express train and skipped the stopped that I needed plus a few more. So I walked around to the opposite platform again and waited for the train to take me to Victoria Park. This time, I got off where I needed to and ran to the park to find the crowds shuffling out of the exits. I just missed it.

So, I met up with Shae's girlfriend Kari, another Milwaukee native, and waited in the clubhouse until the team came out of the locker room. Now, Kari is a really nice girl, but the following 30 or 40 minutes that transpired are relatively indescribable. Some words that come to mind are hilarious, depressing, illuminating, and tolerable. The story goes something like this. Shae plays for the Collingwood Magpies. Collingwood is impoverished suburb of Melbourne, and for whatever reason, it's residents are extremely diehard fans of the Magpies. So they formed a fanclub of sorts called "The Magpies Club". This club consists of local residents and relatives of the players who, after each game, sit outside the locker room discussing famous footy players from the past and highlight's from the days game. Unfortunately for Kari, the people are mostly over the age of 50, only talk about the Magpies, and want to get to know her better as Shae's girlfriend. Luckily for me, I only had to go to that event once and they had free food. I don't know what they put in those meatpies and sausage rolls, but they taste delicious. So while we had our ears chewed off about the Magpies glory days and how so-and-so's famous friend that did something in America, one of Shae's teammates noticed our distress and pulled us away. I often wonder how long we might have been subjected to that if he didn't rescue. From there, I went back to Shae's apartment, told him about my trip and some of the places that I had been to. Then he drove me back to the hostel. It was good to have that Milwaukee connection on the other side of the world.

The next day, we started out on the Great Ocean Road - all 17 of us, in 4 cars. The Great Ocean is a road that hugs the shoreline from Melbourne to Adelaide. There isn't much to say about this trip because we were either sitting in the car or stopping to take pictures. I think the facebook album link at the bottom should work for people that want to see what the trip was about.

Basically, we left Melbourne, stopped in Torquay for lunch, stopped at a two beaches and a lighthouse along the way, and made it to The 12 Apostles by sundown. Then we backtracked to Apollo Bay where we met up with the others at cabin looked like it would better suited in northern Wisconsin. We had communal dinner and breakfast the next day and then headed out again. This time, we took a detour to see wild Koalas and Kangaroos, before heading back the Gibson Steps, and the 12 Apostles for a second time. We continued along to the road to Loch Ard Gorge, Port Campbell for lunch, London Bridge, and then Bay of Islands. Then we backtracked along the GOR for a bit and took a detour through the inland to catch a glimpse of Triplett falls before the last ounce of sunlight had vanished. After that, it was a nice 4 hour drive back to Melbourne. In the morning, we checked out, drove to the airport in the rental car, and caught our 8:30am flight.

The Great Ocean Road: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2709875&id=8645910&l=7518438acd

Moving On

After two weeks of looking at online listings, using the UQ Accommodation website to find local ads, and spreading the word among my friends that I'm looking for a place to live, I finally have living arrangements!

I had visited several houses in St. Lucia that were near where I had been living, but none of them seemed too keen on me staying for such a short period of time (7-8 weeks). Most people wanted to leave rooms open for people that would be living for 6 months or more. And since tenancy laws in Queensland are very strict, it's almost too much of a hassle and risk to sign people on for such a short period of time. At one point, I considered living on a futon in the corner of the living room of some people that I had only met once before because rent would be so cheap.

About a week ago, before deciding on a place to live, I decided to head down to the Accommodation Office to see what my legal rights were as a tenet and to let them know that they were facilitating the ads of the person that was putting me out on the street. They told me that she was one of those rare cases that they always hear about, but still more sane than some other people in area, which was mildly consoling. But, in my conversation with the people there, they told me that a person in one of their houses recently moved out. Apparently, the university owns houses that are right next to campus that they don't tell anyone about, but reserve to help out students that would have issues in finding a place to stay or finding a place that would suit their disposition. In other words, not me. But, since it would be such a short stay and they thought I might have a hard time finding a place to live, they offered it to me. It sounded good to me, so I told them that I'd probably take the room.

Then, my friend referred me to a friend in her building that was willing to let me stay at his place for a few weeks if I needed to. He, like most Australian's, felt really bad about my circumstances; both the moving out at bad time, and having to live with a deranged 50 year-old woman. After meeting the guy, his flatmate, and seeing their beautiful apartment, I had basically decided to live with them if the rent was going to be reasonable. But then he told me that their lease ended May 30th and I'd have to find a new place to live after that.

At this point, looked to my schedule. Classes end June 4. The next week is a study week. My first exam is on the 19th. I'll be leaving Brisbane after exams on the 26th. Maybe I should take a trip after classes and before exams? Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. But I still need to find a place to live. So, I asked around some more for people that would let me stay at their houses for the month of June. To this, my French friends, Amelie and Alexandre (fraternal twins) answered with an offer for me to stay at their house from June 1 through the point at which I leave Brisbane. They have extra places for people to stay and it would be a lot of fun for us to hang out, since we basically had been seeing each other every few days since I arrived.

Things were starting to look good. I had basically found places to stay from when I moved out of Alice's house until I would leave Brisbane for a road trip. Then, this past weekend, I went over to my friends' apartment. While, I was there, they asked about my move out situation and offered for me to sleep on their couch if I wanted to instead of going to the other apartment first. Seeing as I had known them for several weeks, they are American, and their apartment is twice as close to campus as the other apartment, I decided to live with them instead.

So, two days ago, I packed up all my stuff, cleaned my room as best I could, and moved out of Alice's house . . . finally. It only took two trips, but I made it. And, after two nights, I would say that things are looking up. I just need to worry about passing my classes now.

So things have been busy lately

First of all, I'd like to apologize for not posting in a long time. I've been doing a lot of travelling and sightseeing, which is really amazing, but it has left me with little time to update my blog.

Secondly, I am being evicted from my house at 18 Fifth Ave for some unknown reason! It's a really long story and you don't have to worry about me getting in trouble with the police or anything. My lessor/landlady Alice is just a bit wacky and decided that everyone had to move out for her "health". It's probably not the real reason why she's kicking us out, but that's neither here nor there. I'm currently looking for a new place to live, which isn't the most fun thing to do in the middle of the semester, and I'll post some details about that when I get the chance. But for now, know that I don't live at 18 Fifth Ave. Also, if you've mailed something to that address and I haven't acknowledged that I received it, then it hasn't arrived. Let me know if you have sent something so that I know not to burn any bridges when I leave. :)

Thirdly, once I get a chance, you'll be able to see some pictures and hear a little bit about my Scuba diving liveaboard, the volleyball trip to Byron Bay, and my most recent trip to Melbourne and the Great Ocean Road!

Cheers

A Week In Cairns

About a month previous to the Easter Holiday (April 3 - 11), the UW people started planning for the week that we would have to really sink our teeth into what Australia has to offer. We decided, but not at the same time, to go to Cairns. Some of the people were going to be skydiving, bungee jumping, and whitewater rafting, while myself and a few others would be SCUBA diving on the Great Barrier Reef and then checking out the rainforests in the area.

For me, the plan was to arrive on Sunday morning, take it easy for two days, head out on the reef from Tuesday to Thursday, come back for a day and then do a day-long tour of the Daintree Rainforest, the Daintree River, and surrounding area. For the most part, that's exactly what happened.

It was overcast and rainy for the first few days that we were there, but it cleared up for the rest of the trip

Daintree Rainforest: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2703636&id=8645910&l=52a893c2b7

Great Barrier Reef: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2703596&id=8645910&l=8a2ca58b97

Status Update

It’s been a long time since I’ve updated this blog so I apologize if you’ve been holding your breath. It seems that I am still having trouble finding the time to sit down and write because I've been keeping busy with so many things. Even now I'm a little embarassed to see that my last updated was for the Gold Coast Hinterlands, the trip organized by QUEST, since I've been able to see many other things since then. But, I will try to keep the chronology of this blog consistent so as to keep a good record of what actually went on down here in Australia. This blog will cover a few events that happened since GCH.

In the weekend following GCH, I participated in a 4’s volleyball tournament and another QUEST Event, an NRL football game.

The volleyball tournament was being put on by the UQBVC and the basic premise was to get there early, randomly assemble four person teams and play volleyball for the rest of the day. And for the most part, we did exactly that. People brought some beer or wine which helped make it a really relaxing day. Most people had shown up by 9:30 and we began the pool play by 10am, which is still really early for a Saturday in my book. There were eight pools and four teams in each pool. Once each pool winner had been determined, we set up a bracket and played single-elimination until the end. Although this may sound like we were taking volleyball seriously, the clubs main focus was on the social aspect. Since only four teams could be playing at any one time, most people were just hanging out, talking, and making new friends. We kept ourselves busy by practicing on high jump equipment that was just behind the volleyball courts, by playing Frisbee, and by kicking around the soccer ball. University students have such short attention oh look a bird! They even had this gigantic volleyball that we thought would be really fun to play with until we realize that it was much heavier than we had anticipated and had almost broke our arms trying to hit it like a normal volleyball. Anyways, my team won all three of its pool play games and continued on through the quarterfinals to lose in the semifinals. It was really a heartbreaking loss since we were about to win, lost a point and the serve to a technicality, and then ended up losing the game. But, like I said, it was a very social event and we had forgotten about the loss by the time we were off the court. We also played a game where everyone got in a single court and we played the game with normal rules. Except in this game, if it’s your fault for losing a point, you have to leave the court. Slowly, the number of people that are on the court becomes just one, who is declared the winner. That was a surprisingly really fun game, especially when the really good people were the first people to get out. When all the games had been played and food consumed, the sun was setting and it was time to go home. My feet and back were scorched, but the day had been really well spent. It was time to get some sleep before the NRL game the next day.

The NRL (National Rugby League) football game was a match between the Brisbane Broncos and the New Zealand Warriors. But before the game, we met at a sports bar up the road to have a few drinks, eat appetizer food, and learn a little bit about Australian sports (NRL, NRU, and AFL). After that, we all walked down to the SunCorp Stadium, took our seats, and began roasting under the midday sun. I had been told that the Broncos were the winningest team in the league, so I was expecting a blow-out. And that’s exactly what we got. The Warriors killed the Broncos, 48-16. Of course I don’t really hold allegiance to any team, but the game also wasn’t particularly interesting to watch. NRL rules are a bit different than the rugby that I’m used to watching and it wasn’t a close match. I guess you could say it was like watching an indoor American football game somewhere in southern California, except it was being played outdoors. The Kiwis made a lot of noise during the game though. They were having a great time. It was almost more interesting to watch them than it was to see the match itself.

The next weekend was the beginning of our Easter Holiday, which means that we didn’t have class on Friday or the rest of the following week. (I'm still not sure how the entire country shuts down for a religious holiday. If you ask an Aussie's about it, they're either quite proud that the reason for the holiday is Easter, or they don't care as long as they don't have to work. If Easter is the reason for the holiday, it automatically becomes sacred to them. I guess I can't blame 'em for that.) It also marked the beginning of my trip to Cairns where I had planned a 3-day/2-night scuba diving liveaboard. You’ll hear more about that in the next post.
Cheers

The Hinterlands

On Sunday, I went to the Gold Coast Hinterlands with QUEST. The Hinterlands is a rainforest region that is near the Gold Coast, but a bit further inland. The trip was really cool. It only took us about 1.5 hours to get there, the sun was out all day, and the waterfalls were particularly nice since it has been raining here recently. In the same trip, we drove 20 minutes to The Natural Bridge. The bridge itself wasn't too spectacular, but the river and rainforest around it were so awesome. Everything is green, green, green. You don't always see the wildlife around you, but you can definitely hear it. Anyways, here are some pictures from that trip.

Status update

Hey guys,

Sorry I haven't posted a blog recently, things have been pretty busy down here, but in a good way. Everyday there is something different going on and there are new people to meet. I've spent a lot of time learning about different events, both on and off campus, and trying to take part in as many as I can.

The picture that I have posted here is the front of my house from the street. There isn't much to see, I know, but it's actually a decent house on the inside. My address is 18 Fifth Ave, St. Lucia, QLD 4067, Australia in case anyone wants to Google Map it or something. If you do that, you can also see what the other houses in the neighborhood look like. The big fence in the front is there to keep people out of the pool just on the other side. Seems odd since the pool never gets cleaned and nobody wants to swim in it anyways.

Last week Tuesday, my roommate Charles invited me to go bowling with his friends and it turned out to be a great decision. Virtually everyone there (9 people) was also French and absolutely terrible at bowling. They had done the same thing last week and knew what types of scores to expect, so they asked me how good I was. I hadn't bowled in 2 years, so I didn't think that I would be so good. Well, the first game I bowled a 111, the next highest was around 90, and the average was probably 60. Already, the French were heckling me and telling me that I'm a terrible liar, etc. In the second game, I bowled a 169 almost entirely by accident. Meanwhile, I watched gutterball after gutterball. I would have felt bad for laughing, but everyone was enjoying themselves. That game, my Charles bowled a 38. In the end, all the French people just assumed that all Americans are great bowlers and I made a few more friends.

Now that I've finished my third week of classes, I'm beginning to form a routine of sorts. I go running whenever I get a chance and there is still light out, which is suprisingly rare. It gets dark around 6 pm here, so I've only gone about six times so far. I also try to go a different route each time to see more of the neighborhoods, so it actually serves two functions. One thing I noticed on all of my runs is that it smells like food everywhere. Bacon, chicken, BBQ sauce, cucumber, pasta are some that I can identify. It's strange, yet soothing at the same time.

My roommates are all very nice and we get along quite well. I have had similar experiences with everyone in the house so it's easy for me to have conversations with them, with the exception of Leandro the Indonesian guy. We talk about variety of things; from TV shows, to US colleges, to evolution, to medicine, to engineering. Mostly, though, we swap stories about our"lessor" Alice and the animals that she has running around. Occasionally I will see them on campus, which a nice relief from the sea of unfamiliar faces that I'm accustomed to.

Even though things are busy now, they will continue to get busier. The projects and homework assignments are starting to kick in and so are some of the plans that I had made. This Saturday, I'll take part in the 4's volleyball tournament put on the UQ Beach Volleyball club. Then on Sunday, I signed up to go to a lunch/rugby game with QUEST. The weekend after next is the beginning of our Spring Break. I'll be spending the entire week in Cairns and partaking in a 3-day/2-night scuba liveaboard. I haven't planned for the rest of the days, but I have a feeling it will be filled with sightseeing/hiking, swimming, and possibly whitewater rafting!