Alright everyone, the time has come. No, it’s not the end of the world and no one to my knowledge has won the lottery; however, I am indeed updating my blog.
As I was skype calling my dad today (shout out to you Dad!!) he pointed out that it has been nearly 2 months since I blogged and I realized that I have simply let Australia get the best of me, and have forgotten to let everyone back home in on how my new life has been! No worries, I am still in one piece over here just living life to the fullest, but that’s not to say I haven’t been having my fair share of homework.
So where to begin...I think it will be easiest if I take a few paragraphs to touch on some of the main things that have been happening in my life lately, and then I’ll probably do a whole new post on the trip I just got back from in the Outback of Western Australia! So, here it goes!!!
Life at the P&O
As I’ve mentioned before, life at the P&O reminds me a lot of being on a reality TV show. There is always someone awake and around, people are always gossiping and talking about the latest drama and we’re pretty much family at this point. Every Monday night we have a “community dinner” where a group of four people have to plan and prepare a meal with a starter, main course, and desert. We are given $300 and have to plan and cook for around 40. I helped prepare Curry one week with the campus minister, Tom, and the school priest. It was a great experience learning how to cook traditional Indian curry! Typically, students are preparing the meals, but that week we had them as guest cooks.
The week that Kaylee’s parents came to visit, we were on for making community dinner (she’s my roommate, by the way). We spent a lot of time on the Coles’ (local grocery store) website planning out the cost of our meal and spent a good two hours in the store searching relentlessly for our food. We decided to make chicken shish-kabobs with sweet corn and baked beans (plain kabobs mean a tortilla wrap here, so we must not forget to distinguish that they were SHISH-kabobs!) haha We also had chips and an assortment of dips for our starter. For our dessert I made a chocolate chip cookie cheesecake bar that was an absolute hit!!
Community Dinner that I helped to make!!
I should probably mention that I have become known as the house mom because I really like to bake. It all started one week when I was really stressed and kind of homesick and I wanted some sweets. Since I gave chocolate up for lent (which has been failing lately...oops) I needed to make something that did NOT have chocolate in it. I have been collecting a few recipes while on the website Pinterest, so I wanted to test them out. Needless to say, they were a hit with my housemates, especially the boys, so I have continued to feed the hungry!! Mom always said the way to a guys heart is through his stomach!! I have found this to be extremely true. So far I have made Lemon Ricotta Sugar Cookies, Sugar Cookie bars, peanut butter fudge, and chocolate chip cookie cheesecake bars. Yummy!!!
A few more things to note about the P&O—we have to pay for laundry ($3 to wash and $2 to dry), but a lot of us have decided to save some money and just dry our laundry in our rooms and since it’s so hot outside the clothes dries within an evening. My room is nearby the laundry room, as well as by the girls bathroom so it is extremely convenient! It also happens to be the second largest room, so Kaylee and I are very pleased iwth it!
My desk area...look at all the pics I printed off (I was getting lonely without them!)
My bed and desk area...I sleep with my fan on EVERY night
Our “getting ready” area...where we get pretty and stuff....however, note that there is no outlet by the mirror so we have to curl or straighten our hair in the bathroom if we want to be able to see what we’re doing...poor design plan if you ask me! Haha
Our closets
The view from our balcony...we got lucky enough to have a room that opens right onto the balcony. The room with the lights on is home to some other study abroad students from Portland, Oregon...that dorm is called Cleos.
We are actually located only a few blocks from the local beach which has been really convenient. A lot of times we will head to the beach for a few hours in between class and catch a few sun rays before heading back to our next lecture or tutorial. It has been quite funny to show up to class and find snad in my bag or in between the pages of my notebook. I found a lot of sand in my research because I was reading my research while on the beach!! Haha....what we’ll do to be able to spend a few more hours in the sun by the beach!
School at University of Notre Dame (UNDA)
I know people are really interested in how school has been here compared to in the states. I have to say that it is actually a lot different from what I had expected. First of all, I expected it to be much easier. Everyone says that studying abroad is all fun; however, on the Australia program, I’d have to say that I spend A LOT of time working on school work. It’s not even homework but rather a lot of papers.
For class in Australia, you have a two hour lecture where there are a lot of students in one room and the professor mainly talks AT you, although most of mine actually ask questions to the class during that time as well. Then, later on you also have a one hour tutorial that is lead by either the same person as your lecture, or a different tutorial person. (We don’t call them proffesors or profs, but lecturers and tutors).
Another huge difference as I sort of mentioned is that we don’t really have class to class homework because we only have each class (lecture) once per week, as well as the tutorial. We have a lot of reading, and then only a few assessments, usually in the form of papers.
Right before we left for our week long group excursion we handed in our first large essay. It was for our Australian History class with Shane Burke and it wasn’t really all that difficult. Everyone here was freaking out about their essays because we were told that it would be really hard but honestly, the only major difference is that they measure their essays by word count, not page numbers so it had to be a 2000 word essay (aka 8-9 pages). It also needed to have a minimum of 13 sources but it was recommended to have more to get a better grade so I ended up with around 21 sources! Crazy, so you definitely couldn’t wait till the last minute to start it!
The grading system here is a little different as well, but CSB-SJU interpret the grades so it can still look like we got our good grades back at school in the states. It’s because they grade on a curve here and give out credits (our C), distinctions (our B or AB), and high distinctions (our A). I actually got a theology paper back and it had a ‘D’ on it...needless to say I may have skipped a few breaths before I remembered that that was a GOOD thing. It meant I had received a distinction on it, and an ‘AB’ back in the states at CSB-SJU! What a relief!
I am taking Aboriginal People, Children’s Literature, Church and Scripture (upper division Theology), Australian History and Society, and Study Abroad Seminar with Janelle Hinchley (our study abroad coordinator).
We had to dress like an Australian icon for our Study Abroad Seminar class, so Kaylee and I dressed like the popular Australian food, Vegemite!!
Our Australian History Paper was driving us crazy!! SO MUCH RESEARCH!!
Caversham Wildlife Park
We have a few outings that we go on as a large group. At the beginning of March, our group had taken a bus to Caversham Wildlife Park right near Perth (by Fremantle where we are staying). We got to see so many great animals that are from Australia including a wombat, lots of kangaroos, a few koalas and a couple crazy Australian birds.
CSB-SJU Study Abroad Group shot at Caversham!
Meeting the Wombat
Feeding one of the tame kangaroos; they’re kind of like deer, and run free in the wild. However, there were a bunch in captivity and are really friendly so we got to feed them!
Petting my new koala friend...he’s sleeeeeeeping. These little guys are SO adorable and need to sleep close to 20 hours each day!
Rottnest Island
Another group outing was on a Saturday to Rottnest Island. The only way to get there is by ferry, so bright and early one Saturday our group took the ferry to Rotto with Janelle and her husband Greg. The only way to travel about the island is via bike. We all rented these stylish red bikes and Janelle broke us into small groups to tour the island and try to find and take pictures with as much stuff as we could. We spent the morning riding along the oceanic shore and stopped to take lots of pictures. The water was so amazingly clear and blue, and there were so many different little coves and beaches to stop at and take pictures by the white sandy beaches.
Cars are not permitted on Rottnest so the only way to get around is to bike!! These were our stellar bikes that
we took all around the island.
By the lighthouse on Rottnest Island overlooking the Indian Ocean
There are so many places that you can stop and snorkel or swim at as well. We even found this lighthouse on a hill that we couldn’t take our bikes up to so we just sidetracked with a short hike. We ended up meeting this group of women that has been coming to the island for a weekend vacation for the past 21 years!! They were so cute and funny and they chatted with us for quite some time on the hill. They actually reminded me a lot of the ladies from ‘Mamma Mia’. So funny!!
An overlook at Rottnest where you can go snorkeling.
If I were any good at surfing Rottnest Island looked to have quite a few promising areas to go surfing! I stopped for a few pics along the biking so I could prove that people DO actually surf in Australia!!! It’s just that the waves at our beach near our rooms doesn’t get big enough waves to do any surfing.
Finally getting to see some surfers in action on the swells.
After our lunch stop we all decided to take a short travel to one of the beaches where we spent the afternoon taking in the Australian sun and doing some snorkelling. We hope to go back to Rotto to do some more snorkelling and exploring with an overnight trip there. We were told that the best way to experience all Rotto has to offer is if you spend a whole weekend there because there is just too much to see in one day. It is possibly one of my favorite places in Australia so far!
All the ladies at the beach on Rotto after a long day of biking!
Perth
So I have only talked about Perth briefly before, but basically Perth is the larger city to the North of Fremantle. They are basically all connected but to get to Perth you can take either the CAT bus or the Transperth train (both are public transport). It is super easy to get to Perth and we have gone there for a few things. They have nicer restaurants and cheaper shopping so we have done some exploring there. So far I have been to Subiaco to go to the Gold Bar club, and have also spent some time in Harbour Town at City West shopping mall which is one of the train stops right before Perth. Still have to go there to check out some of the free museums and parks. They have Kings Park which is this HUGE park with lots and lots of grass!!! [Dad, I hope you enjoy the mowing reference ;) ]
Since people drive on the other side of the road, even crossing the street can be tricky. LOOK RIGHT!
Food
Since money is tight for all of us we don’t do a lot of eating out; however, we have tried a few of the cheaper restaurants in town. We have gotten fish and chips at Cicerello’s and Sweet Lips, both fish and chips places on the boardwalk. We have also gone to Little Creatures, one of the local breweries! They make some really great cider there as well! They have kangaroo skewers and also some great nachos.
Little Creatures Brewery and Grill is a great place for a cold drink and some great nachos on a Friday night!
There was a man making extravagent balloon creations one night at Little Creatures.
There’s a boardwalk by the ocean where a lot of ships dock and there’s a strip of restaurants with lots of seafood!! Fresh fish and chips (aka French fries) are a fun treat!
We have gone out for half price nachos a few times while being here as well! It makes for a fun night out after class and when nachos are only $8 and you can save half of them for the next day’s meal (poor college kids), a $4 meal isn’t all that bad!! Also, it makes for a great place to go to celebrate a birthday or special event! We have lots of fun exploring the area!
Half off nacho night for one of the girl’s birthdays (not this girl though, this is Katie Asproth and we were just sitting by each other).
On Sunday afternoons around 4 pm, we all head to the Fremantle markets where they have lots of venders selling all sorts of fresh fruits, veggies, and eggs. I have even gotten some fresh olive oil here! The markets are open from Friday-Sunday, but on Sundays the prices get slashed and you can get GREAT deals of 3 bags of fruit for $5!! Kaylee made a video one Sunday so I will have to upload that too! It’s absolutely hilarious to watch the venders fight with prices because they are in a battle to lower the prices so you buy their stuff. Sometimes you can bargain with tehm, but I have yet to get anyone to lower the price of their avocados...maybe by the end of hte semester I will figure out the trick to it!
Beaches:
As I mentioned, there are quite a few beaches around the area, and so far I hve only had the chance to make it to a few. They are all so different and some are absolutely calm, and others are a bit more choppy. Depending on the winds there are sometimes jellies (aka jellyfish) in the water. They will sting, but it won’t hurt that much, and will end up feeling similar to a bee sting. I haven’t had to experience this yet, but I’m sure at some point this semester I will.
Cottesloe Beach
This beach is a short trip on the train to get to, but it is by far one of my favourites. You can do lots of wave jumping here, and on a good day might even catch a few people surfing.
Heath Ledger’s favorite beach. Apparently his ashes were spread here!
Bathers Beach
This beach is right next to home and is where we usually go during the ngiht or day to hang out!
Kaylee and I have tested out our stellar snorkelling skills at the local beach...we usually just find rocks and sand haha
A snapshot of the beach that’s only 2 blocks from our dorms!!
South Beach
I like to run to this beach because it is only 1 ½ miles there, and it is a really nice beach. There is a footpath (aka sidewalk) that leads you right there and if you get tired once you’re there, there is always a free bus that can bring you back! Super convenient.
Enjoying a sunset at South Beach with Brenna
Netball
As we’re in Australia, a few of us decided to take a chance and take part in a sport unique to Australia. It is called netball, and is similar to our basketball; however, it is actually quite different. The hoop does not have a back board, and you are not allowed to dribble the ball. The game is quite fast-paced, but the minute the ball gets in to what resembles the three-point circle in bball, the game stops and you are only allowed to block the shot from three feet away. Pretty much if you have any height on your team you are sure to win...it kind of stinks because we lack height haha.
We play every Wednesday night, and I must say I am SUPER proud of our team’s progress. I am the captain, and we went into our first game just hoping we wouldn’t look like idiots because I had the different positions written down on a sheet of paper, and from there we just kept asking the refs for advice! It seemed like a crazy chance to take, but the refs say we are the best American netball team they have seen so far at UNDA. They also said that we have improved greatly from when we first began!
Our team name is the P&Os (where we live and also can stand for the Presidents and Ozholes.) *Team name not created by me. A tricky thing about Netball though, is that we keep getting called on fouling, and I think that the refs still think we don’t know if they are making unfair calls, but trust me, I know and I am NOT happy about it!! Our Resident Director, Anna, was on a netball team last year and she is from Australia and has been coming to our games to give us pointers. It has been really helpful to have her guide us all into our positions. Each player on the court is one of seven positions:
Goal Keeper (GK), Goal Defense (GD), Wing Defence (WD), Centre (C), Wing Attack (WA), Goal Attack (GA), and Goal Shooter (GS).Each position is only allowed within certain sections of the court and the court is divided into three sections. It has definitely been challenging, but it has been such a great experience!!!
Team huddle between quarters...trying to figure out what the heck we’re supposed to be doing!
Action shot!
Our netball team, The P&Os (Presidents and Ozholes!)
Well everyone, that is all for tonight. I have another long post coming tomorrow when I give the more exciting update about our weeklong trip to the outback!! I just got back from that trip tonight and need to reflect on it, so hopefully I can provide you all with a great taste of the outback in that post. I hope to start blogging every night before I go to bed so I can keep this up!! I know you all would love to hear more about my adventures, and I truly apologize for not keeping you informed more!! Love and miss you all!!!!!
♥Love and God’s Blessings from Australia,
Christine
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