26/02/2007
Catching up - Today is the start of my fifth week away from America. It has been outstanding, and I must bring a much needed update to my Blog. Before I go to the past I'll begin with what I'm planning for March. My schedule is now firm, and I do not have class Thursdays or Fridays. Being so free with four day weekends I plan to start travelling this next weekend. Courtney (my girlfriend) and I are going to be travelling south to Brisbane this upcoming weekend, north to the great barrier reef (lady Musgrave island) the following weekend, and then possibly very south to Sydney at the end of march to meet up with my grandparents.
Good News - One more tidbit of information before I go back a few weeks. I have been accepted to the chiropractic school of my choice WSCC in Portland, Oregon! Very exciting news and its nice to know I have a destination for next fall. But now back to my second week down under.
Week four
first week of school, in Australia!-three days a week. This week was a jumble because I was changing my schedule daily, and I wanted to end up with three courses. The mission of dropping one of my classes was a tough one. I went to each of my four classes, thinking I may drop it. Functional Anatomy on Monday, is similar to a kinesiology course and I love the subject so I kept it. Art and design 100 on Tuesday is a photography/graphic design course that will help me take better pictures of Australia, so I kept it. My neauroskeletalmuscular rehab course on Wednesday, has a phenomenal instructor who earlier in his life had my dream job of doing sports medicine for heaps of pro teams (Australian rugby) so I kept it. With such a fantastic Mon-Wen, I had to hope Thursday would be horrible. When I went to Australian Vegetation Thursday morning I was not disappointed. It was a subject that was, to my ears, so completely dry and filled with jargon and taxonomy I was happy to drop it. That is the story of my fourth week in Australia and how I developed the four day weekend.
And that is where I'm at/ what I'm doing and I'll be posting again soon
Cheers!
Week Three
Orientation Week. As a proud Student Orientation Counselor (SOC represent!) at MSUM I must say the Aussies can learn a bit from us. Although orientation was helpful, it was not nearly as exciting or as event filled as ours, and I think MSUM deserves to be proud of that. It wasn't all bad though, and there were a few fully sick highlights!
Dancing with the aboriginies. To begin a serious week of orientation the international students gathered together for brekkie (breakfast) on week three's Monday morning. After eating a muffin and juice we had a traditional aboriginal welcome that introduced us to the native culture of the land. It was very informative and demonstrative that looked at their culture, instruments, and traditional dances. Toward the end of the performance I was chosen for audience participation and was used in a dance that was traditionally done to show off skills and attract aboriginal females. During this type of dance the males portray a certain type of animal. For my sexy dance I did "the kangaroo" which was quite funny for the crowd and there are a few good pictures in my album.
Frasier island adventure. This was a three day two night trip put on by select instructors of the university (science and business faculties both present). Even though the weather was a bit rainy it was an awesome trip. Frasier Island has the world's longest sand beach at 75 KM and has a forest filled interior with many brilliant freshwater lakes.
On the first night me and five others where chosen to cook supper for the rest . While standing in the kitchen prepping the food I looked out the window and there it was. So beautiful! A pink berried lilly pilly tree, the first fruit tree I had seen since landing in Australia. This was especially exciting/funny because before arriving I had falsely envisioned Australia as a fruit tree covered wonderland. We made the pink berrying into a jam that we put on ice-cream for dessert. It tasted a bit like cherries, or lychee but was not completely like either. Too easy! The second and third day we spent bumping around in our 4x4 land cruisers through the islands interior and along the beach. These vehicles felt much like wooden rollercoaster's so the ride was interesting. Some of the sights were a hike up to Indian Head lookout, snorkling in the Champagne Pools, a large beached ship from the 1930's, colored sand mountains, and ideal skim boarding at Ellie creek. When we weren't in our rigid 4x4's we did two very cool hikes(one through the rainforest) where we saw toads the size of rabbits, many large spiders, lizards and many crazy looking plants and fungi. On Sunday night, as we arrived back at the university, I was very tired and ready for school to start.
Week TwoI
originally planned to travel this week, but I found out there was enough to explore in the local area that I didn't need to go too far. I had a couple of my first barbies(delicious), bought the essentials, and continued to getto know the locals. It was easy to get comfortable and the weather was very nice.
My start to the surf. When I went to the beach with Australian Tom Hansen, I thought we were going to go surfing. Instead I was introduced to a sport called skim boarding. To successfully skim board you have to run (holding a very short board) build up speed, drop the board, hop on and skim across the shallow bit of water that meets that sand of the beach (think skateboarding on the beach). If you are good, and you are at a steep beech, you can ride a skim board into the ocean and catch some decent sized waves as they break. If you're me, you can hop on the board and be really excited about riding it for a couple of meters. This activity is going to become the basis for my surfing career and hopefully I will soon get the chance to learn to surf. In the meantime I have bought a skim board because it can be done at any sand beach no matter the size of the wake.
Week one. 2/1/2007 - 2/4/2007
My first post in Australia! So exciting. I have experienced so much Australia and school does not start for another few weeks . The path has been a bit bumpy in parts but the company and scenery has been heaps of fun. Every journey, story has its starting point and I suppose that is where I will begin.
Snow-storms to sun-storms. It began January 29th, a bitterly cold day. I sipped my coffee as I waited through the first of many delays. Strong wind, and a bit of snow held me in anticipation. As I finally boarded my Fargo plane and took off from the icy runway, I was quite relieved. In LA I realized I had packed far too much and struggled to get from point A to B rolling and carrying three very large bags. After a few more hours of delay, I was kindly told that my plane was missing a key engine part and I would have to catch another flight, either that same night or one three days later. I made the difficult decision of leaving that night on a flight through Melbourne. A very long journey, full of problems, mix ups, and junk food was all forgotten upon a beautiful arrival.. until my travelling companion (Courtney) and I discovered that the airlines had also lost our baggage. Although we did have to wait a few days to receive our bags we did not let it spoil the trip.
We took a van ride from Brisbane to the "Sippy Downs" suburb of maroochydore. Brisbane is a striking image of green.
Varsity apartments - My living quarters. Lucky number 59. Three star living at it's finest. Within the secure gated walls of the varsity apartment complex is a sand volleyball court, pool, lap pool, work out facilities and a tennis court. The rooms are very nice, each with its own bathroom. The people are very friendly, and I have already met many local Aussies, as well as people from across the us, Canada, Europe, Africa and Asia. Although this is random, I met a guy from England who played soccer with young phenom Freddy Adu. School doesn't start for a couple weeks but it seems there is a very high percent of exchange students at the school making it a very cool international experience.
Wollies! Also known as woolworths' is the local grocery store and was my first destination once comfortable in the apartments. It is a nice 20 minute walk to wollies, but once we fill up our cart with mangoes,