How ya goin?
Honestly, I don't really have much to write about, but if I'm blogging it means I'm not doing homework (which is fine by me!). In fact, I would much rather be laying on the beach right now avoiding my homework than sitting on my computer avoiding my homework, but it's cold out! Last weekend was so beautiful when I was getting my dive certification! It was 25 degrees and sunny all weekend, and this week it's more like 17 degrees, rainy, and windy.
Every morning I wake up in Australia and it still amazes me that I live here; I can't quite wrap my head all the way around the idea. The Perth area is just so beautiful...even on days like today!
I had a pretty eventful week. Tuesday was Sarah's 21st birthday and we spent the week celebrating it; we had some great times! I also ate emu and camel this week, and we are putting the final touches on the plans for our road trip (we leave Friday!!). Sheesh, I just introduced three topics, so I guess I'll start with the food. The dining hall has this awkward habit of making strange entrees, but not making anything else, like normal food, so you're pretty much going to go hungry if you don't eat the bizarre meal of the day. One night dinner was camel meat and another it was emu, no one else was willing to try it, but I figured "why not? It (probably) wont kill me!" The emu was alright, kind of tough meat, and it tasted a little bit like beef. The camel meat was super weird though! It was chewy and it didn't have a taste that is easy to describe, honestly I've never tasted anything like it. Truth be told, I probably won't be eating either of the meats ever again, but at least now I can add them to the list of things I did while in Australia! During my road trip up north I am really hoping to be able to try some Kangaroo steak. Apparently the meat is an awkward purple/red color but is really good! Can you believe that Australians eat their national animal? Sad day. But I guess it doesn't seem so bad when you think about how there are 5 kangaroos to every person in the country, crazy right?
So Sarah turned 21 last week and we had so much fun planning for it and attempting to make her birthday in Australia one that she will never forget. Megan and Jenny, being the artistic girls that they are, made Sarah's birthday card as well as the "banner" that we hung up on her door. The card was huge and super fantastic; they carried it around the college Monday night collecting money for Sarah's gift as well as letting everyone who wanted to sign it. The girls ended up collecting $100 for Sarah which we gave to her with a certificate explaining that for her birthday we had all chipped in to pay for "an experience" during our road trip. I'm pretty sure that Sarah is going to use the money to help pay for the snorkeling the girls are doing in Exmouth while Jeni and I dive. So Tuesday morning (Sarah's birthday) Jeni, Jenny, and I got up early(ish) to blow up a thing of balloons and decorate Sarah's door with the streamers that someone had picked up at a party store. Jeni had been blowing up balloons much longer than I had been and she got to the point where her fingers hurt too much to tie the balloons; so she would sit there and hold 2 inflated balloons in her hands and one in her mouth until I was able to tie them for her. It would have been funnier if I had been more awake. Jess made a chocolate birthday cake for Sarah which we had later that day, and it was amazing. I had to get my piece and then dash away to make it to my 6 o'clock class. I left a little bit later than I usually do so I was power walking across campus trying to eat my cake without dropping any of it. I looked classy, for sure. I made it to class just in time to finish my cake, sit down, and pull out my notebook. I don't know why people gave me so many weird looks for eating cake and walking across campus, I mean, aussies don't wear shoes. That's much more strange.
Tuesday night when I got back from class we went out for dinner for Sarah's birthday--no one should be forced to eat St Cats food on their birthday. It was a suprise for Sarah, so it was a lot of fun hustling her to the bus, through Freo, and eventually to Little Creatures, which is this awesome brewery right on the harbor, so the entire side that faces the waterfront is glass so you can see the water while you eat. The 9 of us ordered 3 pizzas and 2 massive baskets of chips...there was so much food and all of it was delicious. At the end of dinner was funny to watch the 9 of us try to figure out how to split the bill, who knew math could be so hard when 9 people are trying to do it! It took a whole lot longer than it should have, but the amazing part was when we finished we had the exact amount of money that we needed. We left dinner and Jess pulled sparklers out of her purse...it was like 4th of July, only without the BBQ and fireworks. The plan was that we were going to catch the train back into Perth after dinner, but we found this really epic park to play at instead! It had one of those massive rope spider web things that you can climb, jump, and swing on that we played on for a while, but it's really hard to climb that thing in skirts and dresses. The park also had those zip line things that go between the different platforms! I haven't been on one of those since I was a kid, it was so much fun!! I also did the monkey bars, climbed slides, played on the swings, and pretty much ran around the same way I did when I was in elementary school. Sometimes acting my shoe size is just so much more fun than acting my age! So by the time we finally left the playground it was almost midnight, and on a Tuesday night in Perth, that means everything that is open "til late" was closing. We called it quits and took the train back to Claremont where we would catch the last bus back to UWA. We turned the corner just as the bus pulled up to the stop so Mary ran to catch it and she got to the doors just as the bus driver closed them and pulled out. He was such a jerk. There was NO way that he didn't see us all running down the street, there was no one on the bus, and he was the LAST bus of the night, yet he still didn't wait an extra 30 seconds so we could get home. We had to hail a taxi and pay to get home that way. I'm still kind of bitter about it, in case you couldn't tell.
Friday night was less formal and more of just a night out on the town. We put on our dancing shoes, wrapped Sarah up in a banner that said "HAPPY 21st BIRTHDAY" and went into the city for the night. It was a lot of fun and thankfully the 80s place didn't play Twist and Shout like they did last time we were there. The song was stuck in my head for days after that.
Last night was a chill out night, we just kind of hung around pretending to be productive since Jeni and I were signed up to dive today with the shop we got our certifications at. DSS had the harbor shut down for the day and as part of "Project Aware" were were going to dive in the harbor and clean up trash. Jeni's dive master last weekend was telling her they once found an entire four poster bed during another clean up. But the monsoon woke me up at 6:20 this morning and I knew there was no way we were going to dive in weather like that. The wind was practically trying to knock our college over, and the rain was coming down in buckets...sideways. Jeni was adament that we were not going to be diving, but I was still kind of hoping the weather would be nicer in Freo and/or the weather would clear up in time for our dive. We caught our taxi, got to the train station, waited in the monsoon, and got on the train to Freo before my phone rang. It was the dive shop calling to let me know they were rescheduling the clean up dive for another day. I was kind of a little bit bummed because on top of really wanting to dive, I really wanted to see Dean again. I have one of those "teacher crushes" on my dive master; but I think it's ok. He's only like, 27. Plus, he does all this hardcore stuff and has a hot aussie accent. You really can't blame me. Anyway, after the call we were kind of stuck. The buses don't run until 9:00 on Sunday mornings and it was 7:45, so unless Jeni and I were going to pay for another taxi back to St Cats, we weren't going anywhere. We ended up taking the train to Cottesloe where we stopped in at some adorable little diner for breakfast. I am very much looking forward to having my leftovers for breakfast tomorrow! The weather didn't end up getting any better until around 5...and then the next batch of rain blew in. I actually had to drag my heater back out (today was the first time that I've used it since 'the spider incident'). But, I just have to push through the next four days and then I'll be headed up the coast with the girls towards beautiful beach weather!! It's supposed to be in the low 30s all week in the Exmouth area...which is really 85-90 degrees! WOOT WOOT! I'm gonna get my tan back!
Anyway, Jeni and Sarah have been calling my room phone for the past hour harassing me, I figure it's about time I go down and figure out what those crazy people are up to. I'll tell yall more about our road trip plans real soon! Or I'll just wait until we get back and tell you all about it then!
Miss you all!
Love always.
I am so incredibly jealous that you have an '80s place! I would be there all the time.
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