Days 3-6

Sorry it's been a few days, I meant to update this earlier, but I didn't have internet on campus until today.

Anyways, on Friday I went out to lunch with Dr. Benedict, her nephew, son, and 2 grandkids to a Singaporean/ Malaysian restaurant. That was interesting. I had no idea what any of the dishes were, so I found one that was chicken and rice and ordered that, it ended up being satay chicken if you were wondering. It was pretty good actually. Then back to Dr. Benedict's house to chill out a bit before dinner at her son's house. The food was delicious, he's an awesome cook and photographer. He's got all these amazing pictures of various things around his house. Then back to Dr. Benedict's house to pack up my suitcases. The plan at this time was to bring my suitcases to the International House in the morning before my trip and leave them there for the night, because I wasn't actually supposed to check in until Sunday. So I was going to pack an overnight bag to leave at the house, and then bring the rest to IH, so I wouldn't have to worry about it on Sunday morning.

Sunday morning rolls around, we left the house at about 7:15am and drove into the city. When we got to IH, the senior resident said that I could actually check in, even though I was a day early. So we brought my stuff up to my room (which ended up being the wrong room, no wonder the key didn't open the door!). I just left it in the room and went to meeting spot for my trip. The trip consisted of going to the Australian Reptile Zoo (which had more than just reptiles in it) and then to Hunter Valley for 3 wine tastings (I think they have 187 different wineries in Hunter Valley) and then to a pub and then back to Sydney, all in ~10 hours. There were 14 of us on the trip, we took a 15 passenger van to get there. It was a fairly international group, 5 Americans (3 from CA, 1 from NC, and me), 3 Dutch, 3 Norwegians, 2 Brits, and 1 Swiss. We all had a lot of fun. The zoo was great, we got to pet the animals. Koalas are lazy, they sleep in the tree and turn around to eat some eucalyptus leaves whenever they're hungry, and they're pretty soft with really thick fur. Kangaroos are soft as well, which I didn't expect, but their fur was like that of a rabbit. I also saw dingos (and some dingo pups!), wombats (there were 2 and they were cuddling, it was adorable!), wallabies (mini-kangaroos), pandemelons (mini-wallabies), emus, flying foxes (like a fruit bat), some platys (I still don't know the plural...and the display they were kept in was called a Platypusary) and some odd birds. The we stopped at a subway and picked up the subs we ordered. Then on to Hunter Valley! We went to 3 different wineries, McGuigans, Lendemans, and the Golden Grape. I think we ended up trying about 20 different wine (and wine based) drinks. Various white wines, red wines, dessert wines, and wine based liqueurs. My favorite winery was definitely McGuigans. I also learned that I prefer white wine over red wine, and that port is pretty good as well. The third winery, the Golden Grape, had more of the liqueurs that we tasted. The last one he had us taste was called Dragon's Breath. He told us that we ad to all take it as a shot together. He poured a shot into each one of our glasses and then counted to three and we all drank it. It was terrible! It's chili schnapps. My mouth and throat was on fire! Someone should have taken a video of everyones' reactions right after we all drank it. Everyone was coughing and sputtering. A few people bought a small bottle of it, mainly as a gag gift, I don't think any of them planned on drinking it themselves. Then we went to a pub in Wollombi, and tried their version of jungle juice (a type of port, I think) and hung out for about an hour watching the sun set. There were some drunken locals there as well that were amusing, and they were quite amused by our foreignness. Then we had the long drive (about 2.5hrs) back to Sydney. I walked back to IH and got my room situated (I found the right room). Then the senior resident who checked me in that morning came up and knocked on my door and apologized for leading me to the wrong room, and then he showed me around the building and where everything was. The I crashed and went to sleep.

Sunday, I woke up at about 7:30am and went down to breakfast and met 2 girls there, they were really nice. One of them gave me directions on how to get to the shopping center (aka a mall, but they call them shopping centers here), which is only a few blocks from IH. I went over there, they have a Target, a 24hr KMart, 2 grocery stores, and a bunch of other, normal mall-type stores (clothing stores, candy shops, cell phone stores, food court, etc). I got there at about 9am and the Target wasn't open yet, so I went to KMart. They also have these funny ramp escalators here. Its like the love child of an escalator and a moving sidewalk, and I lose my balance every time I step on one. I did my shopping and then carried it back to my room. Finished putting my clothes, etc away and then read a bit. When I went down to lunch, I got my food and was sitting down at a table where 3 other girls were already eating. I was sitting down when I realized that one of the girls was Claire, the other Tulane student staying at IH. After lunch, they were going shopping at the same place I was in the morning, so I just stayed in IH and read a book up on the rooftop (which has really great views of the city!) and then they came back and we took a bus down to circular quay and went to the opera house (the three of them hadn't been yet). It was sunset by the time we got there, which was really pretty. There were a lot more people there than when I went on Thursday morning last week. The sun sets really early right now as well, because its winter. Its completely dark by 6pm now. We made it back to IH in time for dinner, and met up with another friend, Cameron. The five of us ate dinner and then walked around the building. A few people in the group hadn't seen some of the nifty rooms in the building. We went up to the computer lab and then played a game of pool (My team won, but only because of Cameron, no thanks to me!).

Today started the orientation activities (O-Week). We had various sessions all morning, with morning tea and lunch thrown in there too. I finally got the sim card that I ordered for my phone this afternoon at lunch (there were a ton of tables in the room, one of them was my new cell phone provider, along with the athletic center, the student union, the international office, and a ton of other things). Then I went to the library and got my UniKey so that I can access the university internet stuff. Once I got my Unikey, I was able to set up wireless on my laptop, which wasn't hard at all. I just got back from dinner. There's a party going on downstairs a little later that I think I'm going to attend. Should be fun! Round 2 of O-Week tomorrow!

I'll leave you with a picture of me and a 9yr old koala named Oscar.