O Week

Ahhh!!! I'm sorry! School started and then my brain would always be like "well if I have time to blog I have time to do homework" and then neither one would happen... I think I have a better grasp of time management now but who knows if that will still be the case tomorrow.

So O Week was the next week which is also known as orientation week but it's shortened to O week. I've very quickly realized that Australians tend to shorten everything which is both nice because I like it but also really confusing because I don't know what they're saying. It doesn't help that sometimes they talk really quickly too. Anyway that's not the point. O week. Basically it's set up for first years to learn about how to survive university. Well as an international student we figured this would probably be good for us too. They also had different events happening as well.

Monday
They had a specific class like thing specific for whether you were going into science, liberal arts, and whatever else you were studying. So I went to that all morning with almost everybody I had met so far because we all seem to be in science. It was really good because we were able to meet the mentors that are students in our field and we can ask them for help if we so desire. Then we met a few of the professors that could be teaching some of our classes which I think I actually met one of mine during that time. We met both lecture professors and the lab coordinator. That lasted most of the morning so they gave us pizza afterwords. We struggled a bit to get pizza at first because we had to wait for the mentors to give them to us at our table and our mentor never gave us one! So we had to go up to them and ask for one which was silly. Then we were going to leave but didn't really have anything to do at that time so we went back and sat down at a table again and then mentors from another group that was now having lunch gave us two pizzas! It was great but we didn't know what to do with them. I think we just left them there and left. After that we went and got our student IDs and a bus pass so that we don't have to pay as much using the bus. The bus is expensive! It will be interesting to see how much I spent on the bus by the end of the semester.

Tuesday

At the botanic gardens =)

Pretty sure I slept in and laid in bed most of the morning. There were more informational sessions that I could have attended but I didn't feel the need to go any of them. In the afternoon they had a tour of Cairns where they got a double decker bus that we rode around town in while they told us where things were. Naturally we went to sit at the top of the bus despite being told that the sun is a lot stronger here than anywhere else (this is a constant theme). We stopped at the botanic gardens and spent about an hour there before we left. It was really pretty as botanical gardens are. Lots of cool flowers and there were signs that explained a lot about how they are used for medicine. Then we got back on the bus to go back. I didn't go to the top of the bus this time because I figured I had been in the sun long enough and I'm not a huge fan of getting sun burnt and getting skin cancer isn't on my bucket list. They had a movie night too and originally we planned on going but it started when dinner at the lodge is so we had dinner and then by the time we were ready to go we figured we had already missed most of the movie and it wasn't worth it so we probably just hung out. Maybe that's when I wrote my first few posts.

Wednesday
This was a long day. We went to get pancakes from the Red Frogs (a Christian group) in the morning and had some half backed pancakes that were slightly unsatisfying but it was free food so I guess I can't complain too much. Then I had to go to the international studies orientation that I originally missed because I was in Byron Bay. They said basically the same stuff that I had already heard before but it was good to get reminded I guess. During lunch they had market day which is where all the clubs set up a table and advertise what they do and stuff. They didn't have as many clubs as I was hoping they would and the clubs sometimes seemed more like an organization ran them then students but that was just what it seemed like to me. I signed up for information for a few of them but I haven't gotten very much information on them still so I guess that didn't work that well. I remember a guy coming up to us at one point and giving us a flyer about a martial arts club (I can't remember exactly which martial arts it was). I was interested and asked a question about where it is and instead of saying where it is he gave me an answer about how they want women who had a bad experience with a man join so they can kind of rehabilitate them (my wording may be terrible on that sorry). Now I think it's great that they want to do that and that it is one of the goals of the club but at the same time I got this feeling at the same time that he didn't want me to join unless that was the case. Which was rather rude because I was really interested and then he just kind of ruined my interest by kind of pushing me away.

After that we hung out till the party of the night occurred. They had a tropical themed party planned where they had a DJ, entertainment, and of course food. I had some ice cream and a snow cone which was probably my favorite part. After the party at the school we got on a party bus and went to a bar. We started at one called Lyquids which was pretty fancy. It was still pretty early in the night so we were the only ones there (this includes everybody on the party bus). With my friends accompanying and ordering for me we got the weakest shot one can get which also happens to be the cheapest (hurray!). It wasn't bad but I don't think I ever want to have more alcohol than that, especially in a public place. After that we danced a bit (me very awkwardly) and then ended up being the last people there. So we left and found a different bar called Woolshed which is a backpackers bar. We stayed there for a long time (longer than I would have preferred). We danced some (a lot) and after a while I was just done. You have to realize that I had been doing stuff nonstop for over a week and my feet needed a good rest still so they hated me and hurt a bunch so I found a random stool and sat next to my circle of friends that continued to dance. It was an interesting experience at this bar because a guy came into our circle of times and would grab one of the girls awkwardly dance with them spin them and then the girl would swiftly make an escape. I'm just glad he didn't try to dance with me because I have no idea how I would have responded. Eventually I went to get some air and since it was cooler outside than inside the bar (which is saying a lot) I decided I would stay there for the whole time. One of my friends joined me outside and then another joined me. Eventually we left but we had to get a taxi because we missed the last bus. Then bed and happiness.

Thursday
I don't think we really had anything planned and didn't need to go to any of the sessions they had so we may have gone to buy some things at the closest shopping center. In the afternoon the school had a scavenger hunt set up and me and one of my roommates went to do it but it wasn't exactly what we were expecting. The items on the list were kind of weird and we didn't really want to do it after getting the clipboard with the list on it so we left the clipboard on a picnic table outside the building where they had organized it. On the way back to the lodge (which is where we are residing) these people clearly doing the scavenger hunt tried to complete the task of "taking a selfie with someone without them noticing" with us. He was so obvious about it though! He started walking backwards and was clearly taking a selfie. So I pointed it out because he really could have done so much better. I said he could still use it but I'm pretty sure even in the picture you can tell that we knew what he was doing. Pretty sure we just chilled after that too. There wasn't that much going on that day.

Friday

Sadness :'(

We went to a lot of sessions in the morning because we figured they would be useful. They were pretty much how to survive in university and the resources available which we had already heard about a lot but it did clear up some confusion that we had so it was worthwhile. In the afternoon the student association (which is the group of students that organize all the fun things that have been happening on campus) had organized a trip to Palm Cove, a beach. So we took the double decker bus to the beach again. Once we got to the beach it was pretty unfortunate because we couldn't actually swim because of the irukandji. We couldn't even swim in the netted area which was rude. So we sat on the beach and put sunscreen on (because the sun is stronger here than anywhere else) and the student leader made sure we had sunscreen eventually. We really only stayed on the beach until they brought us food. Once we ate or food we left the beach to explore the shops that were by it.

The beach at Palm Cove

We got gelato which was nice and refreshing considering it was really hot. We went into a couple of shops with gelato in hand and then we needed somewhere to throw our cups away but we couldn't find any trashcans (or bins as the say in Australia)! So one girl went up to these people working at a hotel lobby area and asked if she throw her trash away there and the lady just took her trash. So we all did that same. Since we were already in the hotel (which was confusing to me because we never went through a doorway) we ended up going to their pool area. At first I thought we were just going to look at it but we ended up going in. Then I thought we would just sit at the edge of the pool but me and this other girl ended up going into the pool because it was hot and the pool wasn't crowded and why not. So we did and it was really nice. The pool was super nice too! It was like a makeshift beach with sand and everything. Eventually another girl joined us in the pool and we ended up just goofing around in the pool. It was really nice and since we aren't as loud as the other American international students the people working there either didn't care or didn't notice. Eventually we left because we had to get back on the bus and I don't remember what we did in the evening.

Well that's my quick update. Hopefully I will catch up quickly since actual school started shortly after this week and I will really only need to talk about the weekend when I did something exciting.