Well...it's been almost a week since I've written. Time flies...I actually can't believe I've been here almost two weeks. (2 weeks as of tomorrow around noon) I feel like so much has happened and I've already become so close with a lot of the people here. So lets see...

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday...

I had a lot of class. Especially Thursday because I have class from 12:30-4 and then from 5:30-8:30. So it's a long day. I'm taking Australian Culture an Society which is taught by our program director, Mark. He's a great guy, and so very Australian, although I do feel like I'm in 3rd grade since we were learning about the splitting of the continents (pangea?) and the history of Australia pre 1700AD. Very weird...

Friday night my friends, Jenn, Rachel, and Glynnis decided to go out to a "fancy" dinner. Because Saturday was Australia Day, the entire month of January has been the Sydney festival where there are $25 meals (entree and a glass of wine) at all of these really great restaurants around the city. So we went to this restaurant...and not only was it not "fancy" or a great restaurant...no one really knew what we were talking about when we mentioned the Sydney festival...we were pretty aggitated. But anyways...we went to this other restaurant on Darling Harbour called Docks, it was really fun and we had some great food. Also, at some point (I forget which day) I got a call from my internship advisor saying I had an interview with the Intercontinental Hotel in the Sales and Marketing department. So that was very exciting!

Saturday 26 January-
Saturday was Australia Day. It was pretty much...so amazing. It's kinda like the 4th of July in the States (?) Except it's not their independence day, it's the day the British first landed in Australia. Unfortunately, it is also called "Survival Day" by the aboriginals..mostly because it's the day he British first landed in Australia. Much like the Native Americans in North America, the British came, took over, and pretty much ripped apart life as they knew it. So I started the day at 8am down by the water where there was a really great aboriginal ceremony, with dancing, singing, and of course the digeeridoo. After that we went over to the Harbour and watched the "ferry boat races." So we were pretty confused for awhile because the boats were slowly exiting the harbour but everyone was sitting waiting in anticipation. Everyone wanted to leave, but I felt like something was bound to happen. Then, all of a sudden, hundreds of boats started going full speed back into the harbour. I thought it was a pretty weird tradition, but I guess they do it every year. I would think that there would be an accident at some point...


After we were at the harbour we headed over to Hyde Park where there was a *lot* of food. All sorts of vendors came, I only had a sandwich, but there was sausage, corn on the cob, thai, greek, and so much more. We hung at there for awhile with thousands of other people, then decided to head back to our apartments. Later that night, we headed back to Darling Harbour for a fireworks show, with pretty much the entire city. It was basically the most amazing fireworks display I have ever seen, complete with music, singing (the national anthem), and sailboats whose sails were lit in different colors. We were also so close that I could feel the ashes falling on me...kind of gross.

Sunday 27 January-
Beach day! ...and I finally didn't get burnt. I only went for about 3.5 hours to Bronte Beach. It was a lot smaller than the other ones I've been to, but had a really cool salt water pool that the waves splashed into.

Monday 28 January-
Today was the day that everyone in Australia observes Australia Day (since it fell on a weekend day). I don't have classes on Mondays anyways, so it didn't really affect me. I finally did some reading for class and hung around. At night, we headed back to ScuBar for some more crab racing since we had so much fun the week before.

Tuesday 29 January-
Today Jenn, Rachel, and I got up early and headed downtown. We were going to go to the Rocks (a section downtown by the water) but instead we walked down George St. (one of the main streets) and did some shopping. It's pretty great right now, because it's the middle of summer here, almost every store has sales! Tonight I just got back from class where we are learning about the early settlement in Australia. Now I need to read for my quiz I have tomorrow night.

Week 2

It seems really weird that I've already been here (almost a full week now).

Tuesday 22 January-
I had my first class last night. It is called "Australian Culture and Society" which is a class the everyone in our program, all 117, of us take. Our "prof" is Mark, he's also the director of the program, and probably one of the most light-hearted people I have ever met. I'm really excited to take the class, it will be fun to learn all about Australia.

Because class is at night I have the day off on Tuesday. I went to Bondi Beach, which along with Manly, is one of the most famous beaches in Sydney. The waves were huge! It was really cloudy when we get there around 10:30, but by lunch time it was absolutely beautiful. (pictures just don't do anything justice)


I've also realized that you just can't stay out all day long like we do at home for a "beach day." The sun is just too powerful, after about 3 hours, it's probably time. I learned this, because yesterday after about 5 hours, and a *lot* of sunscreen.... ya I'm pretty burnt. Live and learn...it's safe to say I won't be in the sun for a few days!

Here is the link for all of my pictures... http://picasaweb.google.com/lizthomforde

Today...it still rained! But the good news is: I finally have internet in my room. That means I can update my blog anytime I want.. like now.

Monday 21 January-
Since it was raining and kinda gross out all day we didn't go to the beach...instead we went to Hyde Park, the Botanical Gardens and around downtown (including the opera house). It was really beautiful and great to see the city ... finally. And I took a lot of great pictures.


Tonight we went to ScuBar...which has some sort of affiliation with Surf Camp (which I'm doing the first weekend of February btw). We went because on Monday they have crab races...yes they actually race crabs.. it was really fun. I just got home, and I'm doing to bed soon, and working on uploading pictures...so keep looking (on facebook and picassa)

So after one day of sun...it's raining again. What a bummer.

Sunday 20 January-
I woke up and it was finally sunny out and completely blue skies! (well.. there were some clouds) There were still trips being led by RA's so I went with an RA (and almost everyone else) to the beach. I bought a bus pass and left from Central station, I think it took about 25 minutes, but it was so worth it. We went to Coogee Beach (pronounced coo-jee) and it was so beautiful and had a really cute town. Coogee Beach is just south of downtown Sydney. I got a really good smoothie there which had mango and mint (amoung other things) in it. Kinda a weird combination. There was also a little fish hut/beach restaurant called "Chish and Fips" (fish and chips.. get it?) I thought that was pretty funny. I also got to hang out with a lot of different people so that was fun.


So I'm a little burnt, even after applying 30 SPF sunscreen...multiple times.

Later that night I went to Newtown with Rachel and Glynnis. It took us a little while to walk there but we finally got to the main part and there were literally 50 restaurants. Mostly asian (thai was a popular one) lots of gelatto, and some shopping. We went to a Thai restaurant called Newtown Thai and had a really good chicken dish with peanut sauce. Also...some of the names of the restaurants and stores were just so funny: "Holy Sheet" "Dolce and Gelatto" were amoung a few of them.

Which reminds me.. I haven't talked a lot about friends. I've been hanging out with girls mostly from SHA. Rachel is my friend I traveled out here with that is also a good friend from school. Glynnis is also in SHA, although I didn't really know here, she's very nice and also 6'2"..aka I'm not the tallest anymore! Very weird! Jenn is in SMG but has taken classes in SHA...she's very fun, and the good thing about her is that she has no reservations about talking to anyone, so it's easy to meet people with her. Those are the main three girls, I'm meeting lots of new people. I think that everyone had there little group now people are kinda branching out to meet lots of other new people.

So it's raining again (Monday) and I'm trying to figure out what to do, maybe the aquarium? We'll see!

Week One

Well...I feel as though my entire life is a whirlwind, but it's slowly starting to get a little bit more normal - and I finally have time to sit down and write this all. This will probably be the longest entry ever, but it does have to cover almost a week, and I feel as though I owe my parents lots of details that I have wanted to tell everyone and just haven't had time. I also want to write everything down so I don't forget it! - I feel like I've already learned so much!

Sunday 13 January -
My friend Rachel and I left the Manchester Airport around 3pm, and with a stop in Phoenix, we arrived in LA Sunday night and stayed with her uncle in "Rollings Hills." Which I guess we would call a suburb of LA? His house was absolutely beautiful and the backyard had a view of the entire city - which at night was pretty.. spectacular.

Monday 14 January-
I woke up so early on Monday, as expected, from the time change. I got to see the city in the daylight and actually to my surprise...there really *is* smog covering downtown LA...you can see it going through the buildings. gross. We spent the day just hanging out and Rachel's aunt and uncle took us too lunch at Donald Trump's golf course which had a beautiful view and we saw Catalina Island. We left for the airport around 5pm and to my surprise..there was no traffic. I thought this was LA? Anyways...arrived at the airport and a few hours later went on the plane. Unfortunately - my seat was pretty small - but I survived. Our flight from LA was 13 hours - I slept for about 5 hours, watched Super Bad, Knocked Up, one episode of CSI Miami, listened to some music, and had two meals...the eggs were surprisingly good.

Tuesday 15 January-
Oddly enough...with the time change we lost this day. weird?

Wednesday 16 January-
After 13 hours in the plane we finally arrived in Auckland, New Zealand. We had a two hour layover, went through security again, and waited to board our next plane. So I realized when I was getting my ticket and passport out to board the plane that...I somehow lost my passport. I basically freaked out (even though a few friends said that I was pretty calm). I went to the desk and tried to explain and the woman told me (with an attitude) that she had it, I left it on the last plane, and had been paged "six times." Point: Keep better track of your things...I thought I had been doing well but evidently...I didn't. That won't happen again...and I don't know what I would have done if I had actually lost it.

So I actually got on the plane and landed in Sydney. Wow. You could feel the heat once we got off the plane and we got through customs really fast. Cal and Mark, two guys from the program, picked us up at the airport and we got on two huge tour buses. We arrived at UniLodge, which is where we stay and also a Best Western hotel, and dropped off all of our luggage in a huge room. We were all greeted by a man named Pascal who works with the program as the "facilities guy" who is in charge of the buildings, etc. etc. Later I went to my room. Turns out.. it's one of the smallest rooms that I've seen in UniLodge. My roommate's name is Claire... she's a really nice girl, a BU student, in a sorority, and from Connecticut. I went to the mall that is across from my building which has a Target where I bought a $40 bath towel which I promptly returned.

That night we had a barbecue on the roof of UniLodge. We got to talk to a lot of the faculty and staff for the BU Center and had some great food. We had a great view of a lot of the city and unfortunately...it was raining. By the end of the barbecue I was so tired, I went to bed at 9:30pm.

Thursday 17 January-
On Thursday we had a lot of sessions for orientation. I went on the tour of the Sydney Uni (aka university) gym, which made me realize that we are so spoiled from FitRec, and walked around. We also had a girl come from Backpacker's World (a travel agency here) and a guy from Surf Camp. He cracked me up so much and also talked to us about water safety, crocodiles, and told us that more people die each year from coconuts dropping on their heads than from shark attacks.

Thursday night I went out with a bunch of girls to Scruffy Murphy's which is a local pub. We stayed there for a little bit, it was trivia night which was pretty funny and they ended up playing Sweet Caroline, which ironically everyone there knew, and made all of us pretty excited. We also headed to a bar/club called The Three Wise Monkeys, which we later found out is in the "backpacker's district," and that's why it was filled with so many people *not* from Sydney. We met a bunch of different people and there were a lot of people from the BU program there.

Friday 18 January-
Our first session was at 9am which was on "safety" and we did a ridiculous fire evacuation out of our building. After this all of the hospitality/psychology/journalism people met with our advisors all together. They are the nicest/funniest women. My advisor is Carrie, she's loud, organized, honest, and very quirky. The other women, Sharron, is so sweet I think she knows that and told us all that she was going to be a "cold hearted bitch" so people would stop taking advantage of her. Which brings me to the point that Australian people do not care about being politically correct... which is a nice change. Everyone just says what they think.

So by this time...it has been raining for two days. The staff booked a harbor cruise for all of us, which unfortunately was in the rain. A lot of people still went outside though and I have a lot of funny pictures outside when we could finally see the opera house and the harbor bridge. Our hair was...everywhere.

Three hours later...it was still raining. We went to a lounge right near the harbor called the Lizard Lounge. There was a live band playing which was really fun. Later when they closed we went to a club called Pontoon where we danced a lot and learned from a guy who is in the Australian navy that being in the navy is not cool (who knows if this is true) whereas in the US I think that anyone in the military is really highly regarded and gets a lot of attention.

Also... I saw the Real World Australia house which was pretty exciting...because I'm a dork.

Saturday 19 January-
We finally got to "sleep in," just a little... I met a ton of other people in the lobby at 10AM and we all took off to different locations with the RAs. I went to Paddy's Market which is in China town. Everything was pretty cheap and there was a lot of everything... electronics, souvenirs, clothes, and food. I walked around a lot and later we all met back up and went to a show were a man (who is actually aboriginal on his father's side) play the didgeridoo. The didgeridoo is a long wooden instrument that the aboriginals use for celebrations and gatherings. It was pretty neat to hear his life story and learn how to play the instrument.

Did I mention it is still raining here? Ya.. I thought I was in Australia! So we walked through China town and back to campus. I've been here since then, and have finally had the time to take a nap and just hang out.

Tomorrow I think I'm going to go on another trip lead by the RAs, maybe do a little shopping, and get settled before classes start on Monday. Now that I have this blog set up, I definitely plan to write frequently. There are so many different things about this culture that I want to write down...I don't want to forget anything. Including...they actually do say "no worries" alll the time. Now, we are planning internships, getting ready for class, and planning spring break and other trips. I'm so excited to explore the city, I feel like there are so many things to see and experience, I'm just trying to sort them all out in my head. I've been taking a lot of pictures and I plan to put them online soon!