Hey everyone, so obviously I haven't posted anything on here for the last two months or so, no real reason, I sort of stopped, but quite a bit has happened since my last post, so I'll try to get through it all as quickly as I can w/o going into extreme detail like my previous posts have been. I've also noticed that shorter, more direct/ concise posts seem to be more appealing than huge,detailed paragraphs so from now on I'm going to do posts like that. Enough said, let's jump into what this post is supposed to be about, my two day trip to Kangaroo Island with group from my university. We had to meet up pretty early, 5:30 - 6:00 to pile into a van and drive to Cape Jervis, to take the SeaLink Ferry to Penneshaw where we regrouped, loaded up all our luggage and piled into a new van owned by the tour company we hired, Groovy Grape, our tour guide was Tony, tall, long blonde surfer hair, total aussie bloke! Our first stop was Victory Hill, (at least that's what I think it's called), the mountain Matthew Flinders climbed only to realize that he had been on an island (what he thought was mainland Australia) for three months! Next stop was the Emu Ridge Eucalyptus Oil Distillery and Bee farm. Then Sea lion Bay. We had to move as a group and slowly, because it was mating season so the males were more aggressive than usual, and because sea lion's vision is blurred when out of the water, and as a group, we just look like a giant blobby thing to them. After that I think it was mostly driving to Flinders Chase were we spent the night. The following morning was the Remarkable Rocks, Admiral's Arch, (including where the sea lions lounge about), this semi-remote beach only accessible via a rocky, half an hour hike, and Kelly Caves (which I wasn't all that impressed with to be honest, (even though our tour guide at one point turned out the lights installed/ blew out the candle early explorers used, but also let us climb on some of it to check out where a cavern led to). We then drove back to Kingscote to watch the Pelican feeding, and get fish and chips, and finally back to Penneshaw where we unloaded, boarded the ferry back to Cape Jervis, and then back to Uni.
Hence the Ligurian bee honey,
found only on KI!
This one seemed to like us :)
Comparing the size of one of the rocks to my friend Gage
This post will be a bit random and bounce around a lot because it's not on any one particular thing or event that happened.
One day Jason and I decided to go to the Adelaide Zoo. Here are some of the photographs I took:
Peacock
Otters
Tasmanian Devil, sorry if you were expecting the cartoon ;)
Red Panda
King Julian?
Timon?
Funi, "Lucky Girl" Giant Panda
On night within the last two months, my friends Luke, Ashleigh and I went to one of the only remaining drive-in movie theaters (Maitland) in Adelaide to see Dark Shadows (the movie itself was a pretty big let-down in my opinion, but watching it at a drive-in theater, a first for me was pretty awesome!)
Another night, Leo, Scottie, Westaway, Frenchie, Taylor and I decided to go see "The Avengers," and on the way out afterwards this happened:
Another night, Ashleigh and I went bowling at the local AMF.
This last video is relatively recent and talks about two exciting things!
Day 63, Friday, April 20th: I know I'm skipping ahead, but I have to be honest, this week I was unbelievably lazy, so I don't have much to say about it. I'm headed to Kangaroo Island for the weekend though, tomorrow to be exact so expect pictures, video, the whole nine yards. Also, I found out about and tried for the first time today, this:
It's a carbonated lemon flavored soft drink.
I also have an essay I need to finish, so I leave you in the words of Edward R Murrow: Good night and good luck.
Day 52 Monday, April 9th: Easter Monday! Since Derrick and I weren't doing anything, we and our next door neighbor Lily decided to take a one day road trip down through SA! Specifically down to Cape Jervis, Victor Harbour, and back. We ended up seeing a couple other things as well.
The picture might be too small to accurately
portray this, but hopefully you can see
the size of the car in comparison to
the size of the turbine.
Now we're at Cape Jervis.
Lastly Victour Harbor/ Granite Island.
Kind of looks like a hand doesn't it?
Day 53 Tuesday, April 10th: I think today was just a chill out day.
Day 54 Wednesday, April 11th: Didn't do much during the day, hung out with Luke and his friend Jason at Jason's house up in the Adelaide Hills for a few hours at night. His parents must be EXTREMELY well off because they're place is huge, it overlooks the entire city, and they have an Olypmic size pool/ billiards table in one of their rooms.
Day 55 Thursday, April 12th: Went into the city around 4:30 - 5 to meet up with my mate Jason and to go see Passenger at Fowler's Live! We met during the first or second week into uni and somehow I never saw him again until this point, even though we're both doing the same major/ degree, Environmental Science. Anyway, I got to Rundle Mall a bit early, which was nice and gave me a chance to explore more of it, (considering every other time I've been there previously was either at night to go to a club and drink or with mates of mine). I browsed through the Arcade, went up to the second floor, found the other Haigh's Chocolate store, and this Australian hat store, etc. Jason and I finally met up and went to Boost Juice, got mango green tea smoothies, and caught up for a bit. I tried to use the coupon for Boost Juice inside my PokitPal, but the lady serving us told us it was expired. Bummer. We then walked out back towards Haigh's and met up with two of Jason's mates, Sash and James. If I remember correctly James had to go to a Vodafone team meeting (since he works for them). We then were trying to decide where to go eat, we settled on this cool place just off Hindley St. called
It was SO good! It might just become a regular for me. It's also very healthy, and the decor inside the restaurant is aesthetically pleasing. We got our food and sat down to eat. A bit later another one of Jason and Sash's friends showed up, Rachel, and then a bit later after that Genevieve, another friend of theirs showed up. We all then got up and walked a bit up Hindley street and popped into Boulevard Café for dessert. James also regrouped with us here. I got a huge slice of carrot cake. Genevieve got something very bizzare. It tasted good, hints of cinnamon, apple, coconut, meringue, custard, but there were so many textures it confused my brain, and anybody else's who tried it!
We sat around and talked, Genevieve and I got into a long conversation about film and vintage cameras, and this is also where I learned that she does photography and visual arts for uni, because of this she was one of the gig photographers! We then made our way over to Fowler's Live. Band posters and memorabilia scattered on the walls and ceiling, bar to the right, merch stand to the left, and the stage area in the far back room. After hearing the opening guy, (looked a lot like Jim Morrison) whose name currently escapes me, Passenger started setting up. James, Jason and I slowly inched our way deeper into the crowd/ room to get a better view. The next two hours were unbelievable, they won my heart almost instantly. Mike Rosenberg, (Passenger) is the lead, and until he started getting more popular it was just him, but now he also has a back up band, and they collectively are known as "Passenger." These next three paragraphs were not written by me, but rather Genevieve, who wrote a piece about him and the show for Our World Today. She summed up the experience quite nicely, not only for herself, but after reading it myself as well!
"All the emotion, soul, passion and thought of Passenger’s music were magnified ten-fold at his Adelaide performance on Thursday, April 12. Passenger makes it his mission to connect with his audience and through his music, his humour, his wit and his charm Mike builds a unique bond between himself as performer and the audience as a group and as individuals.
For over two hours Mike invited us to share the stories and experiences that constitute his life, and in doing so created a unique experience, a priceless memory, an unforgettable feeling of unity and commonality that was shared between one and all in the room.
There is something very special about a musician who can bring people together with nothing but a guitar, the words of the English language and a sizable amount of charisma. No tricks, no smoke, no mirrors. Mike Rosenberg, also known as Passenger, is a modern-day travelling troubadour, sharing his heart and soul with cities, audiences and individuals around the world. See him, buy him, support him – he is superbly worth it."
Afterwards, James, Jason and I started walking back to Jason's car, and it was because of this walk that I got a very nice tour of the buildings that make up the UniSA campus, as well as many of the other historical statues and memorials that that part of Adelaide has in abundance. They drove me back to campus, and I was lulled to sleep the sounds of Passenger still in my head.
*Also, if you're so inclined, check out Genevieve's blog and other works here: http://genevievebrandenburg.com/
Day 56 Friday, April 13th: I don't think I did much this day.
Day 57 Saturday, April 14th: Went into the city today with Leo and his mates for ramen, magic, and thick shakes at PK. Since Leo had been with Danielle the entire week previously for Easter and all, they ventured out to the other Ajisen Ramen on Leigh St., and Leo was quite impressed. They have a fresh lime juice drink, alcohol, and a bigger and better menu than the one in Rundle Arcade, so we decided to go to that one instead. I decided to try the "tori kattsu" (friend chicken) ramen, and upsize it, which just means more noodles. I was the second to get mine and last one to finish. I couldn't drink the broth though, I was so stuffed. For the future I think I'll stick to the normal portions. When we finished we made our way to this card shop within the same alleyway area as PK, and played Magic for a while in a back room. Much better than playing out in the food court at Rundle Mall. Finally we made our way over to Pancake Kitchen. I got a short stack of two pancakes and a coffee malted thick shake. Hands down THE BEST thick shake I have ever had!
Day 58 Sunday, April 15th: Another chill out day if my memory serves me right.
Day 45 Monday, April 2nd: Don't remember what happened this day at this point. This was after all the last week before Easter Weekend and Mid-Semester break.
Day 46 Tuesday, April 3rd: Same as above
Day 47 Wednesday, April 4th: Same as above
Day 48 Thursday, April 5th: Went to Coopers Bar for Harry Potter night. Started out slow, got busier as the night went on. Played pool against Sam, lost. On the way walked back, Sam, Darcy, Roy, Hanna, Lucy and I walked down through the gulley, the first time I had been down there. Walked back to Sam and Kane's place. I tried Bluetongue Ginger Beer for the first time. It was okay, considering I like ginger ale but not ginger in general.
Day 49 Friday, April 6th: I feel like I'm slowly turning into a night owl, considering most of these posts take place at night. Anywho, Derrick and I were watching Dr. Who (the Vampires of Venice episode), and before we could finish it Liz showed up, so we spent the next 20 minutes to half hour talking about random stuff. We all then piled into Derrick's car because Liz wanted a ride to a house party 15 minutes off campus. She could have walked, but it was quite cold out. After dropping Liz off, Derrick asked if I wanted to go for a bit of a night drive. I said sure and off we went, little did I know just how far we would be going though. We started driving north out of the city, stopped at a petrol station, and continued on until we were surrounded by gum trees and rolling plains, i.e. Myponga, specifically the Myponga Reservoir. We then drove over it and continued on to Victor Harbor, stopping along the way so Derrick could show me this:
one of the many Flinder's campuses throughout Australia. This particular one is one of the rural clinical schools for nursing and medicine. After that we drove up to "The Bluff," past the first make out spot and up to the second one. It was so windy that when I tried to open the car door it almost immediately shut back! Derrick somehow managed to light a cigarette and keep it going. Walking up it, I felt like I was in a lucid dream, with the darkness (even though it was a full moon and the only real light source), the massive amount of cold wind coming from Antartica, and following this rocky, uphill, dirt path up a cliff. Once up, the view was quite impressive, you could see the entire city of Victor Harbor all lit up, as well as Granite Island, and the shadow of clouds reflecting off the ocean. A first for me and something you don't get a chance to see very often. After taking some photos, and surveying the view from atop a really big boulder, we made our way down to where the waves crash against the rocks and the bluff. Looking back on it, it'd be a good place to do a photo shoot. Making our way back down to the car was an interesting feat in and of itself, because we started on the normal trail but somehow ended up on a goat trail, where the trail itself was incredibly small, to the point where you're teetering on the edge of the cliff and the wind kept pushing me to the side. Obviously we both made it and are hopefully richer for the experience. We then drove home, but first had to stop at the only gas station open (imagine if it hadn't been there. The beginnings of a horror movie anyone?
Day 50 Saturday, April 7th: The day was so-so. Night was when I went out and actually did stuff. The plan was to go to this tapas bar/ lounge called Casablabla in the city with Ola, Bujo, Kévin, Soufiane and Dasha, (the one who originally suggested we go there). Ola and I met up by the BBQ area behind my townhouse and talked, in between sips of Carlton Draught which I was drinking, and cheap white wine from a bottle that Ola had brought over. According to Ola it was in fact not the cheapest, which was a dollar less apparently, (big spender). After a-while called Bujo to see where he was, said he was walking down to the bus stop, so we hauled ass down to meet him and walk down together. As soon as we get close to our bus stop we see the bus and have to run/ yell to catch it. We get on, and maybe two stops later Kévin and Soufiane get on. We all start chatting and get off, Bujo wanted to find a bottle op (liquor store) to purchase a box of goon (incredibly cheap boxed wine), he did, we all found a table inches from the shop and proceeded to start drinking it. I had about two cups before the guy who ran the shop said we couldn't have it open there, (which makes no sense if you have the tables and chairs just sitting out there), so we migrated over to this alley/ entrance to a parking structure across the street and kept drinking it. By the time we ended up walking over to Casablabla, I was quite inebriated, and was doing all I could to try and regain some control. Everyone ended up going inside, and I was still outside. I was in a bad place. I must be lucky because in the state I was in, I was thinking I would have to walk all the way to Kind William St or Rundle Mall to catch a cab back to campus, luckily there was one sitting right outside, and I told him to take me back to Flinders. Ten to fifteen minutes into the ride I chundered on myself, at which point the driver noticed and pulled over, and then I chunddered outside the car. He told me to take my shirt off, throw it in the boot, and to take my time, all the while I was trying to be apologetic. He was really nice about the whole thing, I ended up having to pay him $100 AU to cover fair and any damages I might have caused to his car, but otherwise for a taxi driver he was really nice about the whole thing. I now refer to this incident as my "$100 mistake." He dropped me off, and I remember lying on my bed, and at one point puking in my bin. Derrick got home, noticed I had puked, and proceeded to try and get me up to the bathroom. I was being stubborn but he eventually did, where I kept puking, took a Berroca, puked that, drank some water, and finally it calmed down. Derrick gave me a blue poweraide and a full coke bottle filled with water to down. I settled in for the night. Let me just go on record by saying that this was not one of my proudest moments for obvious reasons, but hey, you live and learn, and I definitely learned why you don't drink goon the next morning.
Day 51 Sunday, April 8th: I woke up with the worst and only hangover I've ever had. Simply moving made me queasy. I downed about half the poweraide, then tried to go back to sleep. I couldn't, so after a-while I decided a nice hot, steamy shower might help me. I chugged the rest of the poweraide, slowly walked over to the toilet, and almost immediately puked up the bit of poweraide I had just drank. I sat in the shower for at least half an hour to 45 minutes, and felt a bit better, but not much. Needless to say I spent most of the day recovering, and by mid to late afternoon I was feeling much better, so good in fact that I did something I haven't done in months, I had red meat, a steak. Some weird craving I had been having. This was also around the same time that I learned what goon actually is, pure ethanol. No wonder I puked and had this horrible hangover. I made a vow then and there to never drink goon again, I think I'll stick to beer. I learned my lesson.
Honestly this whole week has been a whirlwind of schoolwork and boring-ness, so I'm not gonna bother posting much for this week. Highlights from today (Day 43 Saturday, March 31st) went to Woolies with Derrick and Liz since Liz needed to go grocery shopping. They were almost completely out of bread! I sort of casually wandered around and eventually just walked out and sat on the benches by the entrance waiting for them to finish. Liz and I then went into this liquor store directly to the left of Woolies, where she got a $5 bottle of wine (keepin' it classy Liz). I walked out while she was waiting in line, and then when she walked out I thought something had gone wrong because I didn't see the bottle... she had stashed in the shoulder bag she was carrying. >.< Fail on my part. We start to walk out, and then Derrick signals at me to stop walking so fast, so we slowly crept for a while then sped up to find her waiting for us with a death glare. We walked the rest of the way to Derrick's car, and then I asked: "So, do you go there (pointing to a Dan Murphy's directly in front of us) if you can't find whatever you're looking for in there?" (pointing behind me towards Marion) Derrick and Liz turned around to me, "Yeah, pretty much, they have EVERYTHING!" "You ever been inside one before?" asked Derrick. "Nope" I replied. "Let's go then!" said Derrick. We walk in, every type of alcohol you could imagine was there, and that was one of the smaller locations. We made our way to the back, I ended up buying a six pack of Carlton Draught, and Liz was trying to find a mild 5 Seeds Cider for some reason, you know, the kind with silt at the bottom? She found something like it, we both and then Derrick drove us all home. I'm more likely than not going to head to my friend Becca's place because it's her 21st b-day today! Pre drinks at her place, and then we'll all head into the city and probably go to a club. I kinda hope it isn't Apple...
MESSAGE FROM THE FUTURE! Saturday night and Sunday were the highlights of this week. We didn't end up going to Apple! Allow me to recount to you my adventure on Saturday night in regards to Becca's 21st birthday. It started off a bit slow at her place, considering the only people there when I showed up were Becca, Katie, one of Katie's friends/ roommates but I can't remember her name and Bujo; but more people eventually started showing up, Tony, Pierre, Catherine, Dani, Matt, Marleen, Ariane. Once we had a decent amount of people we kicked off the night playing cup toss, but we didn't have any cups so we ended up using these small little red shot glasses that used be jello shots (mandatory to have on upon entry apparently). You put your cup (shot glass in this case) on the edge of the table so just a bit of it is sticking off the end, and then try to flip it with your finger so it lands upside down. Pierre and I were on the same team, and we went first, ended up losing because of me, he got it on his first try, no worries though. We just each had to take a shot of goon... shudder. Then Bujo had the idea to do guys vs girls. Played them the first time, almost lost because I just couldn't flip it, finally did, had to walk outside to get some air, came back and Tony flipped his just in time to win it for us! So every girl playing had to take a shot of goon. They wanted a rematch so we played them again, except this time Bujo almost made us lose, I flipped, then Pierre did, and finally Tony did to win it for us guys again! Then Katie and her roommate brought over two cakes, one was red velvet (one of my all time favs) and this dense chocolate bundt/ sponge cake looking one. Then we set up Kings Cup, except the deck we were using didn't have any 2's, 3's, 4's, or 5's in it, plus they were German so Kings instead of having a K in each corner had a D or a B. It mostly consisted of rhyme, mate, pouring whatever you drinking into the kings cup (most of us were drinking punch that Katie, Becca and Katie's friend had made), categories, and Marleen and Katie each got a rule. Marleen's was you had to raise your hand every time you talked. Katie's was whenever you addressed somebody you had to call them either sir or captain. After a couple rounds, Becca ended up getting the last King, so she had to drink the King's Cup, which wasn't all that full. A bit later, Bujo gave Becca a lap dance... I wish I had video to show. We all then headed out for the bus and the city. Pierre was taking a while to get ready, so he said he would just meet us at the bus stop, and Bujo had to go back to change. We all walked down to the bus stop, Matt and I chatted for a bit on the way down. He told me that we were going to meet up with his friend Adam, who knew Adelaide really well, and could show us around. Bujo met up with us about 5 minutes after we got there, Pierre never did. We boarded the bus and rode it into the city. Half our group started walking towards Apple, Matt, Bujo, Marleen, Ariane, Tony and I hung back for a bit because Marleen and Bujo wanted to go buy ciggies. Then we headed over to Macca's. Becca ended up calling me to see where we were, I told her and said we'd be on our way. We finally started heading towards Rundle Mall, as soon as we got there we found them taking pictures with this one random group of guys. As we made our way through Rundle, we would constantly stop so Becca could get pictures taken with random dudes. This happened for at least 20 minutes, and during this time we ended up running into Adam! I found out later that Matt and Adam know each other because Adam studied in Poland for a semester or a year last year and became friends with Matt there. Becca somehow managed to get a Jagermeister hat from some random bloke, and Dani got a Jagermeister dog tag/ bottle opener from the same guy! We also had been passing around a goon sack all night, and random guys would see it and yell with excitement, then ask if they could have some. At the advice of Adam, we ended up going to the club Mansions. Walked downstairs and the whole place a dance floor/ lounge and table area. The areas around the bars though, at least the main one was RIDICULOUSLY sticky. Every step made my boots stick to it. It was quite annoying. Got a pint of Carlton Draught, and made my way to the dance floor. After an hour or so we all walked over to the Austral, (not to be confused with the Austral Hotel which is a completely different establishment). Got drinks, reconnected with the rest of our group (Tony, Becca, Pierre, etc). Not the best stuff on tap, but it was more of an actual "pub" than it was a club, a much more lax atmosphere. All of us eventually migrated around a table outside and proceeded to play Never Have I Ever for the next hour or so (at this point it was at least 1:00 in the morning). We then headed to HJ's, then walked back through Rundle Mall and caught one of the buses back to campus.
Day 44 Sunday, April 1st: I'm writing this on Monday because I was a bit too tired last night to write about this day. This day was fun, even though I didn't really do much, being a Sunday and all. I went to Laughter Yoga with Liz. It was a small group, this guy named Fraiser (hippie-dippie kind of guy), two of Liz's friends Pav and Lauren, Liz, the instructor Milan, and I. I was a bit skeptic at first like most, but throughout it I legitimately laughed twice, and felt much more relaxed and chipper than I had before starting. I'm going to try and make it a regular thing. Afterwards we all sat around and had tea and talked about all kinds of stuff. Random You Tube videos, Dr. Who, general life experiences. Fraiser left after about half an hour to an hour or so it was just Milan, Liz, Pav, Lauren and me, and we just kept talking. Then we all said goodbyes, and I hung out with Liz, Pav and Lauren for the rest of the day. I showed them around campus for a bit, the duck pond and finally checked out that trail that cuts through the back half of it. I'll probably start taking that, cut down on my travel time to engineering. Once we were back on North campus, we somehow got on the topic of Pancake Kitchen. We decided to head there, which I was really excited for, since I had never been in all the times I've been out clubbing and drinking, (it's more popular late at night/ early morning for all the drunk people). I ordered blueberry pancakes with ice cream, just like the International Student Guide said to... SO GOOD! I was still hungry after that so I got the Stockman's Brekky. A damper roll, two sunny side up eggs, three strips of bacon and two hash browns. Pav throughout was coloring in a children's coloring book, but then proceeded to do a really good sketch, in colored pencils, of Liz's face on the opposite side of the cover. I was taken back by how good it was actually! They then walked me over to the bus stop, where I waited for WAY too long since it was a Sunday. Lesson learned. I actually called up Bujo to ask him if one of the buses ran on the weekends, and he said he was in the city as well trying to get back. The bus I asked him about came, and just as I about to stay and let it go by I saw Bujo running my way, so we both got on, talked for most of the way back, and then parted ways.
*Next week should be more interesting, since it's the last week till we get "technically" 3 weeks off for Easter and mid semester break! Crazy how fast this semester is going.
Day 31 Monday, March 19th: Typical Monday, have the day off, will probably do some more homework, catch up with friends, try to be productive. If anything out of the ordinary or unusual or exciting happens I'll be sure to update. Turns out I did end up doing things today! Went to Marion with Derrick today because he desperately needed a massage. While he was busy doing that I wandered around. Went into this one, relatively posh, high end men's fashion store, can't remember the name and bought a new pair of sunnies to replace my old ones. Also chatted it up with the lady working there, turns out she's a Flinders student as well, studying law! Small world. Made my way to the second floor and walked into Daily Grind to check out their snap backs, ended up buying a Vans. Off The Wall classic one. Derrick and I met outside it and got hot-dogs at Wendys, then made our way to Target since Derrick needed new cargo shorts. We then headed down to the first floor and went into this one store that sells stuff really similar to Urban Outfitters, with a price to match Urban Outfitters as well! We pushed on to Cotton On, and I got a pair of jean shorts and a lightweight maroon, striped henley. I was kind of disappointed with their selection of tanks, not only because none of them really caught my eye but because Smalls and Extra Smalls were few and far between.
Day 32 Tuesday, March 20th: Pretty sure this was normal Tuesday, nothing too exciting.
Day 33 Wednesday, March 21st: Tried both of these ----->
for the first time today. The Mars bar was good, the Maltesers, eh. They're pretty much like Whoppers, which I'm not a huge fan of anyway.
Day 34 Thursday, March 22nd: It rained on and off most of today, so I stayed inside. Sketched Nory sitting down for my visual arts course, while listening to Ratatat and making small talk, all the while hearing the pitter patter of the rain outside.
Day 35 Friday, March 23rd: Most of today was pretty dull until I had my visual arts workshop for 3 hours. I was quite hungry for most of today as
well since all I had to eat was a Balfour's Baked Custard tart. But I digress. Nathan, Josh, Luke, and I ended up chilling before class just talking about all kinds of random shit, XBox VS PlayStation, COD talk, etc. We then had to draw figures lying down, starting with Fabian, then my friend Cody (which was "interesting" to say the least since all I could really see was his crotch because of the way he lying down). The third and last model was this girl who I was sitting next to, but didn't find out her name till after class, Cenise, like Denise but with a C. After class Cody drove me back to the Village. Pretty soon after getting back Liz stopped by to help Derrick design some pub crawl shirts and watch Dr. Who, which I decided to watch with them, my dumbass being an earbasher and constantly asking questions about it. Liz eventually left, I made the rest of my chicken for dinner, and then somehow over the course of the night this happened:
Day 36 Saturday, March 24th: Woke up at 9:00 AM this morning to go kayaking with other exchange students up at Barker's Inlet (on the Port River near Adelaide Port, between Garden Island and Torrens Island) at the dolphin sanctuary. Alex and Gage went as well. We actually saw dolphins! Except the one time one of them did that skid along the water trick with their flippers we were all learning how to use the paddle and the dolphin did it so quickly (three times) that none of us could photograph or film it in time. Sad day. :( It was still fun nonetheless, and got us off campus and exploring more of Adelaide.
Taking a break on one of the mangrove covered islands while the guide talks about the shipwrecks behind me.
The Santiago, the oldest iron and last vessel to be abandoned at Garden Island's Ship Grave yard I believe.
Once we got back I was SUPER hungry since I didn't have anything to eat in the morning and because I rushed to get to the meeting spot on time I forgot to bring something to eat, so I scrounged up lunch, and then remembered I had these:
in the freezer. The curly wurly was surprisingly good, better than I expected for just caramel dipped in milk chocolate, neither of which I'm all that fond of. Derrick and I hung out for a bit before deciding to head to Nory's place. Derrick (still pumped up from our antics the night before) decided to wear the Sky Runners there, and as soon as we knocked and came in, everyone there was in awe. Claire ended up trying them on a bit later, using Nory for support mostly. Nory and I got our DrawSomething on (well she ended up playing for most of it since it was her iPad, I just watched and once tried to draw a lava lamp but it didn't turn our very well so she took it from me, haha). After a while I remembered that Derrick, Leo and I got invited to dinner at our friend Stephanie's place, so I said my goodbyes and made my way over there. I met Leo's girlfriend, Danielle for the first time, and saw Leo for the first time in two days. We ended up ordering Sahara Pizza (the first time I had had it, I ended up getting the same thing Leo and Danielle get every time they order, "The Lot"), watched Robin Hood: Men in Tights, a few episodes of Dr. Who, and learned about an inside joke between all of them due to early Easter presents given to Danielle from Stephanie and her other flatmate.
Day 37 Sunday, March 25th: Lazy Sunday. Went to Woolies with Leo for a bit, worked on homework, chillaxed. Tomorrow I do more homework and laundry.
Day 24 Monday, March 12th: Aside from being Adelaide Cup Day, hence the public holiday and no classes (which for me is like a sick day in summer since I don't have any classes on Mondays anyway >.<), today was also the day that I went to FUTURE'S MUSIC FESTIVAL 2012!!! It was in Elise Park in Adelaide, the final stop of the tour for the year. I ended up waking up a bit early, so I texted Jason and Lincoln asking when they were planning on leaving for Futures andfell back asleep. Woke up again around 9:30 - 10, to a text from Lincoln saying they were leaving a little past 11. Time to get up. Showered to wake myself up (which, as you'll see later in this post, was kind of useless), got dressed, drank half a bottle of water (no way in hell would I be passing out at an event this big) and grabbed a banana on my way out the door. Headed over to Unit 77 for a bit of pre-drinking where my mate's Sam (who didn't end up going) and Kane (the one responsible for making us all familiar with the festival in the first place) live. I was the only one for about 2 minutes until more people started showing up, and pretty soon we had a group of 16, but not all of these people ended up going. Finally after about 20 - 30 minutes of pre drinking, talking, laughing, checking each others lists of people we wanted to see, we headed to FMC to catch the bus. The ride over was a bit long, although that could have been exacerbated by the fact that about halfway through the water and 1 Carlton Draught I had crept up on me, an by the time we got off I was rushing for the nearest bush! With my consciousness renewed and bladder empty, I ran to catch up with everyone else, and slowly but surely we made our way through the park to the entrance, showed ID and scanned our tickets, and were finally inside the actual venue space. Here's the wristband everyone got and a map of the venue to prove it:
Lincoln,. Gage, Jason and I immediately headed to the Las Venus area, but after a few minutes of checking it out realized we should probably get water, so we walked out to the drink tent and got water, each took a Power Rocket shot (5 hour energy knock off) and headed back into area directly in front of the stage. Soon the more and more people started cramming in. This pic shows every artist that I saw, minus Tinie Tempah and Fatboy Slim (I heard them, but I didn't try to muscle my way into the crowd to go see them).
One of the Stafford Brothers looked really similar to Jeffrey Donovan (the lead actor in Burn Notice)! After about a 5 minute introduction from them, Jessie J started her set. Within 20 minutes I was covered in sweat (my own and other peoples) and packed in ridiculously tight because there were SO many people pushing to get to the front, just a sea of people. The result of this? Jessie J refusing to sing at one point and because there was a "cat fight" going on towards the right of the crowd, as well as having only this:
left of my sunnies. Some fat chick was right next to me and I was holding them in my right hand, someone pushed form the right side, then the left side and back and she tumbled over onto to some other people, and my right hand, and they snapped. Le sigh... the show must go on right, and it wasn't like I could just waltz out of there easily. Then came Chase and Status, and finally Skrillex, (the only artist that I actually knew prior to this). The video footage I shot speaks for itself:
Once Skrillex finished, Jason, Lincoln, Gage and I left the area to go get water, since we had just been in a whirlwind of dust, sweat, sun and drunk people. Jason and I went to go buy water, while Lincoln and Gage went to one of the free water stations. It wouldn't be till hours later that Jason and I would see Lincoln and Gage again. So Jason and I spent the better part of the day exploring the festival, getting food, watching fights (we saw three), randomly running into friends of Jasons' and other people from our group, etc. At one point I remembered that my mate Matt was here as well, and we texted each other for a while to try and meet up, but it never happened. After a while Jason and I were both really tired of standing, so we found a shady spot next to one of the white tents near the Knife Party venue and just shot the breeze, and a bit later our friend Ethan found and joined us. We considered trying to merge into the Knife Party crowd, but there were SO many people heading that way that we just said fuck it. We could sure as hell hear it though, it was a pretty killer set! Jas and I also went over to one of the merch tents, because I wanted to get a hat, but they were all sold out, so I got this tank instead:
After waiting around for about half an hour, Jason and I started walking towards the Swedish House Mafia set, and finally re-found Gage and Lincoln! Once we were there Kane, Brydie, and Kate surprised us with their presence! We slowly but surely made our way deeper and deeper into the crowd. At one point Jason and Lincoln held me up so I could get a better view, but it didn't last too long. A bit later though, after Lincoln held Kate up on his shoulders a few times, he agreed to let me up on his shoulders, where I was able to shoot this:
Wicked good set! We all slowly marched along with everyone else there back out into the city, back into reality. Okay technically it was just back into the park, where we met up with everyone else, Nikki, Alex, Hannah, Izzi, and this one other dude whose name I never figured out. We were sweaty, dirty, and physically exhausted but I don't think any of us cared. We all had experienced Futures, left in one piece, and had gotten to see some of our favorite dub step/ house artist, LIVE, up close (I'm using this term loosely) and personal! Definitely an experience everyone should be able to have at some point in their lives. Half of our group ended up going to the after party at HQ, and the rest of us, one way or another made it back to university.
Day 25 Tuesday, March 13th: I didn't end up going to my engineering lecture this morning because I was still in recovery mode from Futures. No worries though, they're recorded, video and audio. I did however go to my visual arts lecture, which isn't recorded. I learned me some 1st and second point perspective, and got a look at what next week's assignment is going to be, people sitting down. Fun... I then had about four hours to "try" and be productive. I ended up spending the first hour chatting it up with two of the guys from my visual arts class, Cody and Heath. I then went down to the Blue Duck Café/ Balfours Bakery and got myself a custard tart, since I remember Leo telling how good they were and walked back to my room because I needed to make myself something to eat and grab my engineering notebook since I had computer lab for it at 3:00. Had computer lab with Zac and some of the other guys from my engineering tutorial and that pretty much ended my day.
Day 26 Wednesday, March 14th: Yesterday felt intense. Maybe it had to do with the fact that it heated back up quite a bit. Upper 80's Fahrenheit, (I know, I know, I'm in Australia and should be using Celsius instead). My guess as to what caused this increase in temperature, an oil fire in the city, which created smoke that blew east, but there was another wind that was blowing it west, back towards us. Just a guess. Anyway, went to Sociology, where I learned that we wouldn't be getting our essay topics/ questions till next week. Score! Then I had my lecture for environmental studies, then had about an hour break, then had my engineering tutorial. I gotta level with you guys, the guy managing it takes his job a bit too seriously. I think he might be a graduate student. You make a mistake and he just goes off on you! Afterwards I ended up walking down with one of the guys in my group, Peter and we sat on the steps and talked about all kinds of stuff. Mostly he would ask me about certain things in America, differences, similarities, etc. Once he boarded his bus I walked back home, and just in time too. Because a few hours after I got back it started thunderstorming! It was really cool to watch/ hear. It then just started pouring rain, and it would do this on and off for the next couple hours as well, which was nice since it brought the temperature down quite a bit.
Day 27 Thursday, March 15th: All I've done today is work my ass off updating this, and made a big ass breakfast. I still need to do my homework and laundry. So, as much as I hate to cut it short, I am. Peace out Girl scout!
Day 28 Friday, March 16th: A bit of a blah, men, whatever sort of day. Not much happened. Went to Environmental Studies, tutorial where I caught up with Matt and "tried" to work on this wind farm chart. Emphasis on the try. Then went to the lecture for it. The workshop for my visual arts course was probably the highlight of my day. I volunteered to model, and ended up sitting in a chair with my let leg crossed for a good 50 minutes because our assignment over the weekend was to draw/ sketch three people sitting down, a bit like contrapposto I was "in the zone", frozen like a statue, which the teacher Fabian, and the other students greatly appreciated, even though a few of my mates were trying to get me to laugh, smile, move, etc, by either yelling funny shit or whatever. One of them joked about throwing a pencil or easel at me to see if i would move! Haha, crazy bloke that one. Once I finally got up though, and tried to step off the platform, my left leg COMPLETELY gave in and tumbled to the floor. I either invented a new dance move, or did an epic "stanky leg." I had to hobble back over to my easel and sit down on the floor with both my legs stretched straight out. I had that tingly feeling from my toes, all the way to up my thigh. We're talking massive blood loss/ flow here. A couple minutes afterwards I was okay. Anything for a laugh yea? Most people's sketches of me turned out really well, so it was worth slightly embarrassing myself! That same mate of mine who joked about throwing a pencil or easel at me, after Fabian looked at it said that I looked like Sigmund Freud! Then we did the "Barn" exercise to help us further grasp 2 point and 3 point perspective. After class I started heading back down to the Village, and one of the guys I had been talking to during class caught me halfway down, Nathan, interesting fellow to say the least, has huge wooden gauges, wicked good artist judging from his sketches, and super nice/ laid back.
Day 29 Saturday, March 17th: Decided to go into the city with Leo and his friends again today for Ajisen Ramen, (I tried the Paiku, good, but WAY too much fat on the pork), caught up with Taylor and asked him how his experience at Futures was, cards (which I'm not really into so I browsed around at the comic shop next to it), had the picture above for the first time, a chocolate thickshake and 6 fresh cinnamon sugar donuts, (since I had been craving sweets all morning) and then watched them play Magic for about 2 hours while I sketched random stuff on some of the Donut King napkins. Better than sitting around in my room or figuring out what to do on campus on a Saturday no? Yes, I do realize that today was St. Paddy's Day, I just didn't really care, nor was I really in the mood to drink, esp if it involved Guiness, which Leo told me has the color, consistency, and taste of boot polish.
Day 30 Sunday, March 18th: Lazy Sunday. Skyped with my mum though and brought her up to speed with what I had been up to these last couple weeks, and vice versa. Did homework, chilled out.
Day 17 Monday, March 5th: No classes today, which allowed me to catch up on this, including FINALLY being able to upload that other video of me and post my Arrival and O Week post. My PIN # for my NAB bank card came today as well, which is nice so I can now actually purchase/ buy things, including a ticket to the Future Music Fest this weekend! It also allowed me to go to IKEA today with Derrick and Liz where I got two pillows with fake Swedish names and three small "Swedish" desserts. Derrick is now sick, (I may have given him whatever I had), he's also currently trying to quit smoking, so he was a bit on edge. A bit after we left IKEA he stopped and told Liz to start driving because she needed the practice. She obviously knows how to drive in Australia (she's lived here for about 2 years, originally from Washington) since I'm here typing this right now.
Day 18 Tuesday, March 6th: At this point I honestly don't remember much of anything from this day.
Day 19 Wednesday, March 7th: This day was interesting. Went to my Sociology of Nature and the Environment course, (still having trouble remembering exactly where it is). It ended up running a little longer than usual because afterwards I had to haul ass down to my environmental studies lecture, and literally as soon as I sat down the lecture began, which was just the second half/ ending on Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth." I was sitting in a left handed seat, an aisle seat, with my phone resting on my right thigh. When the movie finished it slipped off and under the seat to the right of me. I thought, "okay no biggie, I'll pick it up in a few seconds." Packed up my shit and walked all the way down to the Library and into the Sage Café, (higher quality food than say... Cooper's Bar or the school food but definitely more pricey) and as soon as I ordered, I felt down into my pockets, had my wallet, but no cell phone. I was now in a bit of a pickle, I couldn't just leave to go back and retrieve it because they gave me one of those beeper things that let's you know your meal is ready, but at the same time I wanted to just say fuck it, leave my shit and come back. I ended up waiting for my meal, devouring it (because I didn't have time to eat breakfast that morning and because I wanted to hurry up and get back to the lecture hall). Chicken foccacia sandwhich, Sprite, and a slice of carrot cake, (I've had better for sure). Before heading right back to the lecture hall though, I figured emailing the tc would be a good idea, so I did just that. Then left for my engineering tutorial. Once that was over, I went back to the lecture hall, and waited a good hour and a half, but then realized that there would be at least two if not three more classes being taught in there, and it would stupid and complete waste of my time to wait for each one to finish and spend two minutes between each class looking for it. So I ended up going back to the library to check my email, and what do you know, the tc responded, and told me that someone had found it, given it to her, and that she had given it to the security office, which I was RIGHT ACROSS from, but of course, being that it was after 5 o'clock, they were closed and i would have to wait until tomorrow to pick it up. Shit happens. I also learned about the KONY 2012 movement, and will be participating getting people familiar with it in April when we plaster all of Uni and Adelaide with KONY 2012 posters, to make him a household name, to make him the most famous man on the face of the earth, since he's one of the worst and most disgusting human beings on the face of the earth.
Day 20 Thursday, March 8th: I may or may not be going into the city today for an exchange student only tour of certain parts of Adelaide, like Rundle Mall, Regent Arcade, Bronze pigs, (these first three I've been to multiple times already, usually at night after walking semi drunk out of a club) the Adelaide Botanical Gardens, The Garden of Unearthly Delights, etc. So expect pictures and maybe a video or two if I do. I also picked up my phone from the security office today. Having a shit phone is one thing, but having NO phone is even worse. I did end up going on the exchange student retreat after all. I ran into a friend of mine, Bujo who was waiting at the NAB atm to get money. He asked if I was going, and I said maybe, to which he immediately responded that he was, so I figured why not. We agreed to meet outside University Hall on the steps around 2. I went back to my place, got ready, changed clothes, etc, and then walked down to uni hall. After meeting up with Bujo, we started walking down to the bus stop to meet up with two friends of his, Matt and Ola, both from Poland. We walked the rest of the way down to FMC, (Flinders Medical Center) and caught the bus into the city. Bujo and I talked for most of the bus ride there, with Ola jumping in occasionally. We got off and walked over to the Adelaide Botanical Gardens, met up with the rest of the exchange student group, and walked in. We played some games to get to know names, line up according to X thing, where you're from; egg races, sack races, and finally limbo. I almost made it to the end! We than had snacks and more time to talk to everyone and get to know people better. I learned that one of the profs from my uni back home is here on Sabbatical right now! Small world. We all then walked over to here:
Where we saw a free but extremely lame sock puppet show by these Scottish guys, sponsored by Commonwealth Bank SA. After that I ended up hanging out with my friend Tony, the guy from Hong Kong and four other girls, one was Dutch, one was from Germany, one was from Australia, and another was from Greenland. We ended up just sitting around a table, drinking beer and getting food from the stalls. Looking back on it though, I wish I had taken some time to explore it, I mean, really explore it, because it's a lot bigger than I think it looks. The only time I saw more of it was when I went up to the toilets! Whatevs though. Afterwards a group of us (Ola, this new girl named Purdina, Soufiane, Kévin and Tony) ended up walking over to this bar called Exeter (apparently it's Curry Nights on Wednesdays and Thursdays are legend.. wait for it.. dary). It's a very low key, lax atmosphere, but kind of dingy and grunge, promo posters plastered all over the walls, and from what I remember their drink selection was rather minimal and slim, especially what they had on tap. Simply my opinion. We ended up sitting around this old wooden table just talking, drinking beer, etc. That was pretty much the end of that night.
Day 21 Friday, March 9th: I honestly don't remember much from this day. Let's just say it was a normal school day, because anything else would frankly be a lie.
Day 22 Saturday, March 10th: This day I do remember, or at least the night. It was my mate Soufiane's (speaks French, from Morocco, good friends with one of my other mates Kevin) 23rd b-day! Well technically it was on Thursday the 8th, but it made more sense to celebrate it on the weekend. He decided that a group of us should go to Apple Bar, because they give people with birthdays who invite large groups a pretty big drink voucher/ card. Later in the day, around 6 or 7, I met up with Ola and her friend Jessica, then later Bujo and Matt so we could pregame at Kévin and Soufiane's house. We walked over to one of the bus stops, and waited at least 15 - 20 minutes for the bus. We rode it for maybe 5 minutes and got off one stop too far. So we had to walk back to that bus stop and then make our way in the fading light to Kevin and Soufiane's house, which apparently Ola and Bujo had bussed/ walked to the night before as well. We finally found it and walked in to see Soufiane and Kévin sitting down eating dinner with a male friend of theirs and two females. They told us to go ahead and start drinking in the other room, so we did. Bujo and I started it off with Bacardi and Coke. Sipping on that and eating Dirito's we all just stood around and talked, while Ola served as the DJ playing Youtube vids on Soufiane's Mac. Bujo and Matt then left for the city so they could catch a concert, and said they would meet up with us at Apple. Pretty soon Kevin, Soufiane and all of them finished eating dinner, I polished off another Bacardi and Coke, and they all joined us for pre drinks. A bit later two girls who were flatmates (one from South Australia and the other from France) walked in, carrying two bottles of cheap champagne. Everyone kept on talking and drinking. I had a cup of the champagne with some Schwepps Orange and Lemon juice, not bad honestly. Kept going. Then had a Hahn Super Dry Lager, followed by another cup of champagne and Schwepps. Jessica then introduced me to the drinking game, 5 - 10, and pretty soon everyone joined in the game. After taking pictures, we left for Apple. When we finally got to Apple, Bujo, Matt, and a couple other people were already there outside waiting for us. Once we all got in, immediately headed for the bar, Soufiane ordered everyone vodka and orange juice, and I downed that in about 5 minutes, in between dance session of course. We were all tucked into this one corner in the right side of the DJ stage. At some point while randomly dancing, I ran into my friend Becca from uni, her friend Katie and what I'm going to assume was a friend of Katie's. It was a nice surprised to see her considering I thought she had left for an exchange student trip to Kangaroo Island on Friday. After a while I tapped Soufiane on the shoulder and asked if he wanted to do Jaeger Bombs, which he agreed to. Me, Soufiane, Kévin, and I think two other people went to the bar and ordered them, we all tapped our glasses in honor of Soufiane's birthday and downed them. We all then went back to the dance floor. I had to sit down for a bit. After about 15 - 20 minutes I went back to the bar, ordered a pint of Carlton Draught, and finished it rather quickly. If you've keeping count, at this point I had had 8 different drinks within a relatively short amount of time, and I was DEFINITELY feeling it. A relatively good night out by Aussie standards. After a while I ended up wobbling over to one of the deep easy chairs in the main lobby of the club and just stared off into space for a while, then headed for the toilets and dry heaved for a good 10 - 15 minutes. Then walked out and sat back down in the chair, and literally 2 minutes after headed straight back for the stall and puked. Then dry heaved for a while. I can only speculate on what happened next. Someone must have tipped off the management or bouncers that there was some bloke in the toilets puking his guts out, because as soon as I walked out of the bathroom there were two guys in black who led me to a side door and opened it for me, afterwards saying goodnight. I had just been unofficially kicked out. Soufiane ended up being outside, and called Matt, who at some had left the bar or maybe he had been kicked out as well. Either way he agreed to wait for me, and pretty intoxicated I sped- walk through Rundle Mall, and eventually met up with Matt. We walked over to the bus stop, and started chatting with this random chick, who told us waiting for the bus as well, but thought it would be easier to just hail down a cab and split the fare. After about 15 - 20 minutes of walking around we finally got a cab, kept talking until she got off at Marion, and wished us luck with the rest of our time here in Adelaide. Matt and I continued onto university, got dropped off, I walked back to my place, too smashed to take a Berroca. Fell onto my bed and drifted off to drunken dreamland.
Day 23 Sunday, March 11th: Woke up still a wee bit drunk, and for this reason and as the old saying goes "lazy Sunday" this day was just that, a lazy, chill day to recover, and to try and be productive, homework, grocery shopping, etc. Around 12 or so Leo and I headed for Marion to stop at ANG's café and to go grocery shopping at Woolies (Woolsworths). After looking at the selection of baked goods, Leo suggested I get a ham and cheese croissant as it would have the most sustenance to it, and help cure me of this minor hangover. I agreed and ordered that as well as a pot of loose leaf peach green tea. Leo got a baked custard tart and an espresso. After a few minutes they arrived, much to my delight. The croissant was good and the tea, even though it was extremely hot from brewing in a French press, was extremely soothing. After I finished the croissant, I still wasn't feeling completely satisfied, both in hunger and physically/ mentally from the hangover, so after contemplating the selection once again I ordered a slice of baked cheesecake. The icing on top of it tasted like maple, a pleasant surprise! Leo and I ended up talking for about 2 hours before finally getting up and walking over to Woolsworth. I started shopping and Leo said he would meet up with me back at ANG's. I ended up shopping for a good hour because I wasn't entirely sure what I needed/ wanted to get, on top of not knowing where most things were. Then check out took forever because it was a Sunday, and Monday was a public holiday, Adelaide Cup Day, however I also had a mini panic attack when trying to pay, my total coming out to just under $200 AU. To quote The Weekenders, "later days." :D
Hey everyone, sorry for the delay on posts. Anyway, last week was the first week of actual university, classes and all. So without further ado, let's jump in.
Day 10 Tues, Feb 28th: First day classes for me, ENGR1711, Engineering Design at 9:00 in the morning. Not super early, but obviously if given a choice I wouldn't choose to get up then either! Anyway, I walked over to South Ridge (contains the buildings for biology, physical sciences, engineering, etc). It's a rather long walk from the Village to the campus, 10 minutes at least to get to North Ridge (humanities, law, social sciences, and most of the campus) and then another 5 at least to get to South Ridge, not to mention it's also pretty hilly. I should have legs of steel by the time I'm done studying here. Anyway after trekking I finally made it to the engineering building, walked in, up the second floor, and saw a guy talking to the topic coordinator for my course, who told us where to go. He introduced himself to me, "I'm Zac" he said. "No way, I'm Zach too!" I replied. After walking down to the classroom where the lecture and sitting down, we kept making small talk. After asking a bit sarcastically if there were any left handed desks while scanning the lecture hall, Zac asked me if I was left handed, to which I said yes... I then returned the question and he said he was as well... long lost twins? Babies switched at birth? Kind of surreal. Hopefully we'll become good friends. I then introduced him to the Echo Smart Pen by Livescribe that I use to take notes. Needless to say his mind was blown by it. People started coming in and soon the lecture started. After it, I started to get up, but then Zac told me that there was a second part to this course, from 10:00 - 10:50... oh shit. I was supposed to be headed to my visual arts course (VISA1401) by now. Time clash. I realized at that point it would make more sense to miss it, stay there for the second part of the lecture, which dealt with engineering based drawing and CAD and just email the topic coordinator for my art class and explain my situation/ ask what I should do. The lecture finally ended, I would see Zac later in the day for our computer lab session at 3:00. In the meantime I had over 3 hours to do whatever I wanted/ needed to do. I then went to my computer lab course, and did some pencil and paper engineering drawings. I was still feeling a bit sick, but for the most part was over whatever I had been fighting last week, and was able to try an Anzac cookie for the first time!
Day 11 Wed, Feb 29th: Had to wake up at 10:00 this day for my sociology lecture/workshop (SOCI2007 Sociology of Nature and the Environment). The weather was the complete opposite of what you think when you hear Australia, grey, rainy and cold with a good amount of wind. After trekking for a bit and sort of aimlessly wandering I found the classroom. Considering I was about half an hour early, I decided to use this time to put more credit on my SIM so I could finally call/ text people, since a few days earlier my NAB bank card finally came in the mail! After successfully doing that, people started going into the classroom, and soon enough Gage came in as well. Then the tc came in, a man named Dr. Ross Boyd. He's quite eccentric, often goes off on tangents, and openly admitted this to us, and he smokes! Definitely an interesting fellow; I get the feeling I'm going to like him and this course a lot! The second part of the lecture, (what will be the workshop portion) he devoted to questions. I had one that had been lingering thanks to Derrick. He told me that a friend of his who I met later this week (Liz) got marked down heavily, to the point of failing an essay because she had too many non-British (US) spellings of words! Colour vs color, flavour vs flavor, etc. So I asked Dr. Ross if he would do that, and he adamantly said no, and then of course went off on one of his famous tangents/ digressions about something else. On a random note, the wind was causing really creepy, wailing noises while class was going on. Class ended at 11:50, which gave me 10 minutes to find where my next lecture (ENVS1701 Environmental Studies) would be. I found it with time to spare, but kind of causally asked the motley group of people sitting around the stairs and outside the lecture hall if I was in the right spot, and this one girl, later found out her name was Izzi, short for Isabella or Isabelle, said "Yea, this is environmental studies." For a lecture hall as big as the one where I have my environmental studies lecture, there weren't too many people in it. I was expecting to be just a speck in an endless sea of students. Not the case at all. Not that I'm complaining. The lecture ended at 12:50 and I had the rest of the day free to do whatever I damn well pleased! This won't be the case starting next week, since I have my engineering tutorial at 2:00 on Wednesdays, which gives me about an hour between my lecture and it to grab lunch or whatever I'll need to be doing in the future. I remember at one point walking back and meeting my mate Jason's roommate, Bujo, really nice guy, dreads, from North Carolina, and a marine biologist, just like my mate Sam! We talked the whole way back to the Village. I'm sure I'll see him again at some point.
Day 12 Thur, March 1st: My other free day when I don't have any classes! I honestly don't really remember how I spent the day. If I get an revelations in the near future about it I'll update this bit. :)
Day 13 Fri, March 2nd: Against my better judgment (because I had a feeling there wouldn't be one since it was still week 1) I woke up at 10:00 because I had an 11:00 environmental studies tutorial. After navigating the campus, moving through buildings rather than taking the main roads I found where the tutorial would be held. After waiting a while I thought to check the second location to see if anybody would be there. Nobody at either location... I had just wasted a good 40 minutes... or had I? For when I went to check the first location one last time, there was a random guy wandering around. I asked him what course he was waiting for, he said the environmental studies tutorial. His name is Matt, nice guy, 19, lives about 15 minutes away from the campus. We ended up talking/ waiting for an additional 10 minutes, and then headed back down to the main part of campus in North Ridge. Maybe two minutes after walking down the stairs to the main plaza area, a random lady came up to us and asked us if we wanted to take part in a research project. It would only take 15 minutes and we would make $10AU! How could we pass it up? So we waited for her to grab a few others who had agreed, and followed her to a room, did the project, and we both walked out $10AU richer! I then said i was starving considering I didn't have time for breakfast this particular morning. I spent half of the ten bucks on something I had kept hearing about and finally had a reason to try chips and gravy (french fries and gravy):
I could definitely see this being a hangover food, or at-least something to fill you up if you're in a pinch. Matt and I sat on a bench and kept shooting the breeze, asking each other about all kinds of stuff. It was then time for the second lecture of the week for environmental studies, where we watched the first half of Al Gore's movie An Inconvenient Truth. Definitely an eye opener. Once it finished at 12:50, Matt and I sat on the grass (known as central park) overlooking this duck pond in the middle of campus. He ate his lunch and we kept shooting the breeze. Eventually I had to leave to go to my almost 3 hour visual arts workshop. Made it to the workshop where we drew the tc, Fabian, learning how to break up a subject into sections of quadrants based on your perspective, a new way of holding the pencil while drawing, and a crash course in drawing the face. I met another girl who was left handed like me. Once it finally ended around 5:00, I walked back to my house, not really sure what I was going to do that night. Most of the guys were going to go with our friend Kane to a concert around where the Clipsall 500 was talking place. That ended up falling apart and Sam ended up texting me and telling me to come to Lincoln's house. I headed down and reconnected with most of them, including some of my friends from Uni, Nikki, Alex, Hannah. The cricket game against Sri Lanka was on, and they had just finished playing that drinking game involving Jenga I believe. There was a new guy there though, Jacko, who suggested we play this card game pitting the guys against the girls. It didn't last long, because the girls left to go see an origami penis show thing, which left the room as a sausage fest. To spice things up Jacko said we should all take a swig of Jaeger and cringe. I'm normally not a big fan of black licorice, but honestly Jaeger by itself isn't half bad! We then all decided to go out for the night, to this club called Swish in the city. Next question, how were we going to get there? We ended up getting one of the rental vans, three of us in the front, and 5 or 6 of us in the back on the hard metal. Definitely a fun/ interesting ride to say the least, but I probably wouldn't do it again. We got dropped off outside this upscale high rise, got buzzed in and took the elevator up, where we all met these two girls, whose names have escaped me. I'm pretty sure they were good friends of Jackos' though. Tried white goon and apple juice for the rest time. Definitely needs the apple juice. Goon in general is still nasty as shit though. The girls were really fascinated with us (Lincoln, Gage and I) being we were American and say things differently than Aussie's. After 20 minutes of waiting around, we finally headed out to Swish, getting lost once. Found it, showed ID, no cover charge. I was only to buy one drink, a pint of Colton Draught for $6AU! I had to borrow a $1AU from Nathan to pay for it! Turns out it was Nothing But 90's Night at Swish, so all the songs the DJ was playing were from the early to late 90's, a lot of them I didn't actually know. Is that bad considering I'm a 90's child? After dancing for a good 2 to 3 hours, Sam, Jason and I decided to call it quits, and headed out to to get food. After walking maybe 3 - 4 blocks in Rundle Mall, this random group of drunk chicks and this one black guy called out, "Jason, Jason, Hi Jason!" The odds that we actually had a Jason with us, slim to none. We asked Jason if he knew them, he said no but we walked up to them anyway. An interesting exchange took place. After failing to convince them we were all named Jason, they asked me what my real name was and where I was from. I said Zach and the US, California. Well they're heads almost exploded! They kept asking me to say words/ phrases! Sam and Jason were trying their hardest to put on an "American" accent. Which btdubs, is hard to define, considering we have so many states, and most who try to copy our accent(s) end up using an "actor" to base their accent on. John Wayne for the south, Joe Peschi for New York/ Boston, etc. It's really quite funny, and Sam and Jason both failed horribly at it. They sounded more like radio station hosts than Americans honestly! After that exchange we made our way to HJ (Hungry Jacks), and Sam was nice enough to buy a Whopper for me. Eventually Lincoln and Gage found us, and when we were all done eating we decided to take a bus back to campus, but then realized it would just be easier to take a Maxicab back and split the fare 5 ways. We found a 5 person one, and Jason ended up getting the back section (which was raised and made the cab look more like a Hearse) all to himself. We got back to campus, and Jason ended up paying for the whole thing, so we now all owe him two drinks. I was going to pay for Sam's share of the fare as a gesture of goodwill since he paid for my Whopper back at HJ. C'est la vie though.
Day 14: Sat, March 3rd: Woke up a bit abruptly because Leo was knocking on my door, asking if I was awake, and informing me that he would be heading out to Adelaide, Rundle Mall, for his usual Saturday ritual of Ramen, Magic cards, EB Games, etc with the guys. I laid in bed for a bit longer, and then got up. With the way Leo described this ramen, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to try it. After picking up two of his friends and then parking in a reserved spot thanks to a pass one of his friends had, we made our way to the ramen shop, called Ajisen Ramen. I got the seafood ramen and a lemon iced tea. SO GOOD!
After having some trouble paying, (since I still didn't have the PIN # for my NAB card) we made our way to the card shop. Walking along Rundle Mall though, outside, we happened to oversee a street performer dressed as a gargoyle on a perch, not saying anything but interacting with crowd, at one point imitating a baby in a stroller! Random yea... Anyway, the card shop didn't really didn't interest me all that much, minus the fact that there are now Justin Bieber trading cards... GOOD GRAVY! Leo and I ended up browsing around a comic/ action figure/ merch store just next to the card shop. Once everyone was done making purchases, we made our way over to this shop called Donut King, (kind of like Dunkin Donuts but a little more upscale). I'd have to try something from it some other time. We then sat down at a row of tables, and played Magic for about 2 hours or so. I almost won the entire game! We then headed back to Leo's car, drove his friends home, and then back to campus. By that time it was around 4:30 - 5:00! I hadn't realized how much of the day had gone by. The rest of my day was pretty low key. Caught up on one of my favorite TV shows, White Collar!
Day 15: Sunday, March 4th: Today was a pretty low key day. I had to wake up a lot earlier than I'd normally like to on a Sunday, because today was Clean Up Australia Day. Gained karma points for the rest of the week though. :) Met at the CC at 8:30, had a bar and some juice, then we all walked down to this park across from the medical center. My friends Ashley and Andrew (most call him Chicago since that's where he's from) were among the people who volunteered as well. We talked on the way down, then got yellow latex gloves (like the ones you use for washing dishes) and bags to throw all the trash/ litter we found into. Definitely found some interesting stuff, underwear, a tv, a random bag of stuff, female pregnancy tests, etc. When we got back there was soda and sausages waiting for all of us. I mingled a bit, had about 3 sausages, and then we all headed back to campus. I then decided to take a nap, which I woke up from 3 hours later! The rest of today has just been meh.
