Riverside & The Climb

Another successful weekend in Oz!! This weekend has, by far, been THE most fun weekend since I have been here. And the irony of it is that we didn't think that we would be doing much of anything... boy were we wrong.

Saturday we decided to walk down to the river behind the school. The walk only took about 20 or so minutes. Down by the river there is a rope swing and plenty of room to just jump in and enjoy the water. Of course I was a little weirded out by all of the creatures that could be found in this river.. you know standard stuff like freshys (freshwater crocodiles), eels and snapper turtles. I finally got enough courage to jump in off of the tree (with a little encouragement from my friend Sarah ;)... It was def. worth it!! The water was really warm and it felt REALLY good to let go...



We all went back to the dorms a little later. The next plan was to hike up castle hill downtown. At first I didn't really want to go because I was pretty tired, but I am glad that I did!! The climb up was pretty rough and rather difficult. But we made it! The view was absolutely gorgeous! And we got up there just in time to catch a wedding and the sunset.. both of which were very pretty sights!







Once we got back from the hike we all got ready for the nighttime activity. I thought that we would have ended up going out, but we didnt.. and i dont think that anyone was upset that we didnt. We just hung out around campus and played various games and talked and had a really GREAT time.. it wont be a forgotten night, for most of us, and thats for sure.. and an even more memorable weekend!!!

until next time,
kiara

BBQ on the Beach (and the past weekend)

My, my, my.. time is FLYING!!! Last Saturday marked my first month in Australia! I can't believe that it has already been a month! I feel like I have done so much already...! Let me start with last weekend..

Friday we went to a Cowboys Rugby game. It was actually pretty neat even though I don't understand the game at all. But watching big 'football' guys running around in shorts and sweating and smiling at the camera was pretty fun! ;). After the game we went into town for a little bit, which we have been doing a lot of lately. But it was pretty fun actually. Saturday we went to the Townsville Annual Culture Festival. I really enjoyed the festival.



They had performances, a small market, FOOD, and face painting (which I almost did but got cotton candy, or fairy floss, instead).



It was right on the beach and it was such a hot day that we decided to go for a swim. It turned out to be a really nice day. My favorite part of the festival were the performances, and my favorite one of those was the dancers from the Cook Islands. They danced similar to Hawaiian dancers, but I'm sure there were small details that were different. The girls were pretty young that were dancing which made it that much better. It was a lot of fun to watch.



Sunday I had to do school work =(. But it was a very productive day although I really wanted to go to the beach with everyone else. School work has really started to pick up lately. I just have to remember that I am here for school and NOT R&R.

This week I found out that I will be able to go to the Outback during Spring Break!! The trip will be 10 days long and will consist of camping out in the desert and cooking our own food by campfire!.. I know what your thinking if you know me, WHAT?? But I figure that even if I do come back to Oz again, I will probably not be able to go to the Outback for 10 days. And if you know me even better then you would know that I used to camp ALL the time in girls scouts and LOVED it! At any rate, I am really excited about the trip and look forward to spending my spring break in central Oz.

But today was a really fun day as well.. Our cafeteria at Uni Hall put up a menu that tells us what we will be having for the week. One of my friends saw what we were having for dinner tonight and decided to pull together a BBQ on the beach! It was a GREAT idea and we all pitched in to buy food and stuff. I decided to get a steak and put it on the Barbie.. absolutely WONDERFUL if I must say so myself! Afterwards we all went out on the beach and played around for a little bit. It was a really nice night!

So all in all I am still thoroughly enjoying my time in Australia. Tomorrow we are going to go hike up Castle Hill downtown and go swimming at the river. Hopefully we will get some great photo ops and have a great time.

Until later,
Kiara

Kegs on the Lawn

I don't think that I have a picture to put up for this one, but I wish I did.

Yesterday we were harassed at 6am to wake up and run a track that was 6km. We had already heard that they were going to do this to us, but I think that in the back of my mind I didn't really believe that they were going to do it. So picture this: full moon party on Magnetic Island and we got back around 3 or 4am, then they come around and BANG on doors, set off door alarms, and sing university hall chants. So I decided to go ahead and get up just in case I wanted to head to kegs on the lawn. So a few of my friends got up as well. Some people ran the course, but we walked it (it was like 7am). Afterwards, we went to brekkie and then it was about time for kegs on the lawn. I must say that Saturday afternoon will definitely stay in my most fun days for a LOOOOONG time.

Since we went to cross country in the morning it was only 10 dollars for us to get in. But ten dollars got you all the goon (box wine), and/or beer that you wanted for 5 or so hours. Which is NOT a bad deal anywhere! After a while, we started playing beer pong and people were being thrown in and out of the pool. Then some guys made a slip-and-slide out of trash bags and soap. The slip and slide turned into a big mud pool after a while. And of course people started jumping in. Although it sounds really gross and not as fun now that I am writing about it... but let me assure you that it was a BLAST!!!! Of course the mud got all in my hair and ears, and nose, and probably every open orifice that I have, but it was SOOO worth it! The showers after that were incredibly disgusting!

All in all, not a bad afternoon!!!!

Till next time,
Kiara

PS: Pictures finally surfaced from kegs on the lawn via facebook... here it is... I am SOMEWHERE in the mix...lol

Trivia Night

I just had one of the BEST nights since I have been here! (or maybe I am still just really excited)!.. Anyway. Me and my friends went to Trivia Night at the Club on campus. The trivia that they were giving us wasn't that hard, but the were also doing door prizes and giveaways and all that stuff. And GUESS WHAT.. I won a SKYDIVE TRIP!!!!!!!!!!.. and luckily its in Byron Bay where I will be going in September! I still can't believe I won!AND on top of that.. its not the small dive. its the HIGHEST dive that they offer, 14,000ft!.. AND my other friend won the GRAND prize.. a trip from Sydney to Melbourne!!.. So I think that we may go with her.. if we can get some good deals on flights and stuff. But we def. had a PRETTY lucky night. The MC also bought me and my friend Cara drinks!.. which was really nice.

I think the funniest part of the night tho was the trivia question that the MC came over to ask me. The question was worded as "What are the names of the four railroads on the ORIGINAL english Monopoly game?" and OF COURSE I said very confidently, "short line, B&O, Reading, and Pennsylvania" and the guy laughed at me and said, what the hell is that? Apparently they meant the English as in from England Monopoly game. But that is a twisted question. So I said well the original game is from America and its in English. Everyone laughed and he said the Americans don't speak English.. But that ended up getting me a free drink...

If I must say so myself, not a bad night out.

Until later.. TTFN
Kiara

Classes/Mission Beach

So classes started last Monday. I guess we will see how that turns out. I keep hearing that classes here are much more difficult than back at home. Although, I dont think that I will have another experience similar to Duke this past summer. For the semester I am taking Australian Literature, The Love Story in Cinema, Biodiversity of Tropical Australia, and Human Development across the Lifespan. I do not think that I have a favorite so far. Everyone keeps asking em why I am not taking more biology courses, and I was going to at first, but the more that I look into biology classes, the more I realize that I can take the majority of them at Spelman. And I didn't come here to take the same classes. So far I will still be on track. The only thing that is throwing me off is physics, but I can't do much about that now.

This past weekend, the JCU crew had our excursion to Mission Beach, although we were supposed to be going to Hinchinbrook island. We took a walk through the rainforest, went snorkeling on the reef, had a bbq, went to a winery, and saw the inside of a sugar mill. We came back yesterday. We stayed in a hostel. I had never been in one before. It reminded me a lot of my girl scouts days. It was a room of 6 and the beds were bunked. The name of it was Treehouse Hostel. The place was really quite amazing. The living room was outside and set up quite similar to a treehouse. There were a lot of other travellers there too. But the place was very peaceful to say the least.

When we were on the reef I attempted scuba diving. I was so excited and I told our leader nice and early that I wanted to do it. So when the time came I listened during the intro session, put on all the gear, stepped into the water and completely FREAKED OUT... I went bizerk! I felt like I couldnt breathe and that I wasn't getting enough air. I told them to get me out of that water and probably wasn't too nice about it in retrospect. But what can I say, I would rather freak out beside the boat than to freak out underwater. But I got to see a little bit of the coral when I was stable enough the try snorkeling again (which I wasn't too good at either). But I am willing to try it again, but I think I want to take classes first. I felt like they had just thrown us out there. Plus, there is no better place in the world to learn how to scuba dive than here near the great barrier reef. I tried to take a few pictures of the scenery, but I don't think any of them came out very well.

Oh yea, on the way back from Mission Beach we stopped at a place called Paradise Wateringhole, which was very lovely. I have included a video of it because a simple picture will not do. Enjoy!

Well I must go off to class now, its Biodiversity for now. Until next time...

Kiara

PS: I promise to start blogging more!!