The Wet Season.

Greeting's from the wet season of the Gold Coast of Australia. And by wet I mean, never-stops-down pouring wet. Today was actually what felt like the first day in two weeks it hasn't been raining. But with a 10 day forecast of scattered thunderstorms on weather.com, the air was still extremely muggy and not an drop of sun in the sky. Bull-shark lake is finally back to it's normal level, and the weather advisory emails from the Bond Service-desk have finally stopped. It's quite funny having warnings about flooding rather than snow.

I managed to have some adventures over weeks 2 and 3 (which are technically my 3rd and 4th week here - but classes are all organised (aussie spelling) based on a week schedule (pronounced SHEHdule) despite the lack of beach/pool time. We did adventure to a new beach two Thursday's ago, called Burleigh Heads. My girl friends and I parked it on the beach and the boys went to go see the surf competition - turns out we also missed out on a walk through a beautiful national park on a cliff overlooking the pacific. As soon as the weather becomes nice again I plan to remedy this mistake and return for a hike. We craved a restaurant for dinner and unfortunately we couldn't afford any in sight so I ate a cheap fish sandwich from a little fried food place.

If anyone has been on my facebook, you'll have seen lots of pictures of Australia's wildlife. A group of us from NEU bought groupons for "couples koala pictures" at Currumbin Animal Sanctuary, which included cheaper entry and one professional group koala pictures. The koala's were as cute as expected, but since they are apparently vicious little guys they are kept behind a fence, and the koala's for holding are on a very short schedule. To my disappointment, the couple picture only came with one "hold" so I let Eliza have this opportunity.

There were a ton of really sweet tree's around the sanctuary. So I spend a good amount of time taking picture's of/in trees. Amy said she thought it should be called "The Emily Sanctuary". I had fun.

Highlight of this day was definitely hanging out with the Kangaroo's. Saw lotsa new mothers with pouches full of baby kangaroo's. They were pretty much all sleeping, in fact every animal in this entire sanctuary was sleeping.

I saw many other strange animals. Tasmanian devils, a wombat named Emily, Lorakeets, echidnas, tree kangaroos, cassowarys, etc. etc.  Second highlight of the trip: the rope course I did harnessed high up in the tree tops. I got to wear a really sweet jumpsuit and a harness that invaded too much personal space and got to zipline through the koala trees (not really). It was a ton of fun and a good workout, I hurt for a week. To see more photo's here is my first stab at a picasa web album for those of you not on facebook:
Australian Things


As for on-campus happenings... besides hating the cafeteria and occasionally attending class, I've decided to take part in "Res Wars". For a 20 dollar fee, I got a T-shirt and free dinner weekly if I partake in the activity. Each resident hall competes for a $1000 prize at the end of the semester. This past week was dodgeball. The girls team pretty much sucked, as did the free subway, but obviously the American boys dominated. AKA my entire building = American, more or less. It was okay. I'm in it for the food and the party we will win at the end. This week is trivia... We'll see how that goes.

This past Thursday was Australia day!!! I actually spent it with my close 3 friends at a real life Aussie Barbie. After watching Lamb get cooked at a river/beach park, I got to go jetskiing in this kid's backyard. It was so much fun! Way different than the jet skiing I've done at home, smaller faster ski. (But the speed was in Km - whatever that means - so I have no real idea how fast I went). I got to fall off a jetski for the first time! (No worries it wasn't going very fast I was perfectly safe) and that was surprisingly fun. I actually flipped it myself, and I told my australian friend's he shouldn't be surprised because I have a track record for flipping things.... bad joke.....



This past weekend we took the train into Brisbane because we needed to get away from our wet campus for a weekend and do something new. Plus Sunday was one of my favorite northeastern-er's 21st birthday. We had to make sure this day was special for him since the drinking age down here is 18. Brisbane did not seem like anything special, but I did manage to have a great time. Friday night I impressed a bunch of foreigner's with my karaoke skills. By impressed I probably mean annoyed. Stayed at my first Hostel. All I can say was that was very interesting... not quite in the hurry to go back.

This weekend the four girls are going to Melbourne. I am VERY excited. I think we all need a city-fix living out here in the sticks, and Brisbane didn't quite satisfy that. Can't wait to tell you how it is?





To wrap things up, here are a few things Aussies say/do:

• "How are you going" = How are you doing
• Their response to "thank you" is "it's okay"
• "Toots" = Tutorials
• "Good-on-ya" = good job
• "Brekkie" = Breakfast
• "Chips" = Fries AND Chips
• Italian dishes are paired with Fries
• Heinz ketchup is a real serious treat
• Ordering "ice coffee" often means coffee over icecream
• Saying something "goes off" means it's awesome
• "Giving me evils" = dirty look
• McD's ice cream cones are only 50 cents