A Monster Post for the Past Month...

Well, I left off at the Blue Mountains on Friday night (August 19), so I’ll jump right into Saturday morning. Things looked much less scary in the daylight, and we made it up early to start our hike to Govett’s Leap. To say the scenery was breath-taking doesn’t even begin to cover it. We stood at the first look out over a deep canyon covered with trees, the mountains forming on either side. The sky was only cloudy and there was an incredibly strong breeze blowing the whole time that swept the water from one of the waterfalls away from the mountain at a bizarre angle, making everything look more surreal and beautiful. Once we’d had enough of the view (can you ever really have enough?), we started our hike which took much less time than we expected. The view through the trees as we walked through the mountains was as gorgeous as ever, and we crossed a stream that turned into a waterfall that was even prettier than the first that we saw. Overall, it was a great, peaceful hike, and I definitely want to go back to do more trails.

We had a quiet Saturday night, free of ax murderers, monsters, and the supernatural and we made it back in one piece Sunday afternoon to watch the inter-college AFL game. AFL (Australian football league, I think?), from what I can tell, is a lot like rugby, but different. I don’t know how it’s different, but people get hit just like in rugby and the ball is turned over a lot. Either way, my goal was to provide moral support more than anything, and it was fun to hang out with I-House and compete as a college. Jackie and I had a quieter last night, and I saw her off at the train station early on Monday morning. Thanks again, Jackie, for visiting!! The following two weeks were pretty packed with schoolwork, unfortunately, but there were still On Tuesday was another “Tuesday Topical,” a weekly event I-House holds, organized by the SDOs where they either bring in a speaker, show a movie, or hold a debate. This week was the first Soapbox, a chance for anyone in the college to get up on the soapbox and let out pent up rage, tell jokes, what have you. Apparently in the past, it’s been a steady stream of raging and complaining, but after a few speakers, the vibe turned around and everyone became really positive and shared inspirational stories instead. It sounds kind of hoaky thinking back on it, but the mood was so positive and so energized that everyone seemed to be riding an emotional high by the end of the two hours (normally, Tuesday Topicals go for 1-1.5 hours!). Gotta love I-House and the people that make it what it is! On Thursday, uni held Global Highway which was organized by one of the girls at I-House. Anyone that wanted to represent their home country could get a booth and share information about their culture, hand out food, and do activities. Once you made it “around the world” and had your “passport” stamped, you could get a t-shirt. Elana, Kathleen, and I didn’t get on for team USA, but we went to the event and got to experience a lot of new foods and learn a lot about the people we live with at I-House. Of all the food, I’d have to say Sri Lanka had the best dish, a sticky rice block with spicy veggies and sauce to put on top. My mouth was on fire, and it was delicious! Best candy vote would have to go to Germany for these chewy little taffy things. So good! That’s probably the first event that I wasn’t involved in directly, and I wish I would have. Everyone put in so much work, and it showed, so well done everyone! Over the next week, I went to support a barbeque on campus for a charity called the Girl Effect that a few of the I-House guys work with. They made heaps of money for the charity, and I-House had a great turn out once again. Thursday was I-House’s BYO Academic where they invite a representative from each faculty, or department, and provide dinner while everyone competes in trivia. I sat next to a professor from the arts faculty who teaches medieval and literature, who also speaks French! I felt somewhat in place after my medieval and Renaissance lit course from my last semester at IPFW, so I definitely lucked out on seating.

The next morning, Friday September 2 now, brought Jenn to see me! I woke up at the crack of dawn again to get her from the airport and after waiting for an hour at the wrong terminal (whoops!), Jenn found me at the information desk where I was trying to ask about her flight. We took the train straight back to Wollongong to get settled in, and Jenn accompanied me to the second day of soccer tryouts for I-House’s college team. We had a quiet Friday night and woke up early the next morning for Crooked River Winery. We took the train with a small group from I-House and did the wine tasting, which was even better than I remember from the first time around. Everything was so good that we decided to stay and eat lunch and share a bottle of wine. Jenn and I shared a platter for two with prawns (shrimp), pork, raw salmon, a salad and other veggies. This was by far the best meal I’ve had in Australia and one of the fanciest I’ve had to date in my life. The food melted in your mouth and was just phenomenal. My mouth is watering just thinking about it! We took our time hanging around the winery for the afternoon and made friends with the proprietor, Brian. He even took some pictures for and with us. If you’re ever in Australia, Crooked River Winery is beautiful with great people and, most importantly, unbelievable wines of all different varieties. Saturday night proved another quiet one as Jenn continued working off her jetlag, but we were up early Sunday to walk into town and check out the shops. There was more soccer Sunday afternoon, and that night, since there were a number of I-House birthdays that week, a huge group went out to celebrate at Hostage. As always, it was a fun night at Hostage, and we ended it with a late night run to Macca’s. We also realized that Macca’s has a play place. Of course, Jenn and I being about five years old deep down inside, we climbed inside the tubes and crawled around for a bit. The boys even joined in when they saw how much fun we were having. We left the tubes via the slide, obviously, and came back to I-House to wrap up the night with a movie. All in all, another great night! Luckily for me, I didn’t have half my classes the week Jenn visited since the creative arts faculty had a break, so we got to run around campus on our own time. Over the week, we went to the beach, walked around campus and town, went out to the Grand, visited Nowra Wildlife Park (so Jenn could pet the koalas, kangaroos, and wombats, of course!), and had an incredible homemade dinner compliments of Celli, an Australian friend that lives just outside Wollongong. Our Friday consisted of an adventure day, driving around the coast near Wollongong going toward Sydney and through the mountains. We saw some unbelievable scenery driving over the Sea Cliff Bridge and from a hidden away lookout in the mountains. As if that wasn’t fun and breathtaking enough, we also went cliff jumping at a gorgeous lagoon, complete with a waterfall. The jump was about 8m, I screamed like a little girl, the water was absolutely freezing, and I had a fantastic time! After sightseeing, we went back to Celli’s for a barbeque and a movie, a perfect, calm way to end an exciting, busy day.

The following Saturday was just as busy as Jenn and I headed into Sydney with a big group from I-House to do some more sightseeing and go out for one of the American girl’s 21st birthdays (not quite the same significance as in the states, but a birthday is a birthday!). We did all the Sydney must-sees, like the Opera House, Harbour Bridge, took a ferry around the harbour, and explored the craft market. It was tiring walking around, and we refueled at Pancakes on the Rocks, a restaurant with the best pizza and pancakes I may have ever had. We went back to our hostel to get ready for the night out, and what a GREAT night it was! I was told that nightlife in Sydney is comparable to going out in New York City or LA, and not that I’ve been out in either of these cities, but it felt just like those scenes in the movies. Lasers and strobe lights, three floors with balconies that all overlook Darling Harbour, a huge pulsing dance floor, Home Bar had it all. Jenn, Kathleen, and I stayed and had our fill of the club scene and were among some of the first to go back to the hostel so we could be ready for our 5am alarms – Jenn’s flight left that Sunday morning, so Kathleen and I caught an early train back to Wollongong so we could be with Jenn to transfer lines to the airport. All in all, we had a successful week, and Jenn, I can’t thank you enough for coming to visit!! Hopefully, we’ll continue our globetrotting adventures soon.

The week after Jenn left, last week, was another quiet one for me in Wollongong as I caught up and pushed through some of my studies. Assignments and marking works much differently here; for my English writing and lit classes, there are one or two major papers and a presentation that make up the entire grade; for French, there are some smaller assignments and readings that are more spaced out, which I think is more like classes in the states. The grading system is much different as well. For example, the 80% I received on my paper for American lit translates to an A on the American scale, somewhere around a 93-95%, so my 78% on my first fiction portfolio and the high 70s I’ve been getting in French don’t quite give me the heart attack that they did at the beginning of the session! So don’t worry, Mom, Dad professors, or worried friends, I’m still making the cut, and you don’t need to worry! The last highlight I’ll share with you from this past month is the intercollegiate soccer tournament that was held last weekend. It was co-ed, and I-House has a long history of winning, from what I understand, so I was a bit nervous since I haven’t played a real game of 11 v 11 in over three years. Luckily, we put together a stellar team and made it through the first three games and into the finals, against our intercollegiate rivalry Weerona, with relative ease. I even scored a goal as a right mid – a cross from around the top of the box, trapped with my stomach and volleyed in with a left foot from around the six! It was so good just to play again! The final was a tough game, and with maybe five minutes left and no goals, Ves, another Australian friend (and dancing extraordinaire!) managed to put one in the back of the net for a 1-0 victory. Great game to everyone at I-House!

This week has been another busy one with work in preparation for my spring break trip to Cairns. We leave at o’dark thirty tomorrow morning and will be coming back next Sunday, well rested and hopefully full of new stories to tell. I’ll try and keep the posts shorter after this monster of a post and more frequently too. Thanks for following, and I’ll see you after Cairns! Hope all is well at home :) Here and there, Kiley