All Settled In!

Well, on January 29^th we will have been gone from home for a month! Time has flown by and so far we have been loving every minute of it. We have settled really nicely into our cozy “little flat” and I have completed my first week of school.

Yesterday was Australia day (the 26^th of January) and so I had the day off from school along with my usual Monday’s off- seems easy right? I’m taking every advantage of having a light schedule right now and heading to the beach almost every day after school. This first four weeks of classes is an ‘intensive focus on literacy and numeracy’. I have 2 classes 4 days a week for four weeks and then they add in 7 more classes, all in 4 days a week. I have a 2500 word essay on the Australian Curriculum and Literacy due in 4 weeks and in 2.5 weeks I have a math exam…yippee! Teacher’s college, or DipEd as they call it here, is much different than I expected. I suppose my expectations were based on what I’ve heard from the Ontario Teacher’s Colleges but I almost feel as though I am back in my undergrad. I never anticipated having to write an essay (only one for now) in my graduate program hence me celebrating like an idiot when I finished my degree almost a year ago thinking I would never have to write an essay ever again! Well, was I ever wrong- not only am I writing an essay but I am writing an essay on the Australian curriculum…something which I know nothing about. It should be interesting to say the least- I suppose I’ll have to fit it in between beach visits! Other than the few projects I have going on, school is good. My numeracy teacher actually reminds me a lot of a teacher at home that I had in grade four, Deb Halbot. Mrs. Halbot was the reason I decided to become a teacher because she had a way of ensuring that lessons were interesting, applicable and…fun! Who would’ve thought school could be fun! Anyways, having Katie Waters (my numeracy teacher) teaching this class has been a wonderful experience so far and I am thoroughly enjoying math (shocker!)…for the moment!

The University of Wollongong itself is actually beautiful. It is located right at the bottom of a huge mountain and is located essentially right in the middle of a jungle. The campus is surrounded by beautiful trees and has numerous streams running through it. The above pictures were all taken at the university- I wasn't exaggerating when I said it was in the middle of a jungle right? All of the wildlife pictures were taken on campus as well- the Owl was spotted by Jordan-sharp eyes on his part, this little guy was very camouflaged!
I think that if I did my undergrad here, I would have spent a lot more time actually on the campus than at home. There is a free “Gong” bus that stops just across the street and takes me up to the campus in 20 minutes. The one thing I noticed though is that the campus is very spread out. The joke about Brock University is that you can go from one end of campus to the other without ever having to step outside- this is not the case at UOW. This morning it was POURING rain out and despite the fact that I had my umbrella with me, I got soaked as it took me a good 5 minutes to get from the bus to my classroom. 

For the past few days it has been rainy quite a bit which has caused a lot of floods in the northern part of New South Wales and in Queensland. We have just normal rain (so nothing to worry about) but it really has limited us to what we can do when I'm not in school. Speaking of rain, apparently anything other than sun means that you have little to no internet. Internet here is unbearably slow and extremely pricy. You pay per gigabyte you use which ends up being quite pricy- especially watching shows or using Skype. In between waiting for shows to download (I can’t miss out on Grey’s Anatomy or the Bachelor!) Jordan and I have been playing hours and hours of cards. More specifically, we have been playing Crazy 8 Countdown and Shanghai (a favourite card came that we learned from Sarah and Roberto)!

Last night, after flicking through the 4 channels on TV that we have, attempting to use the internet (fail) and playing hours of card games, I decided that it was time to go for a walk in the rain. Jordan wasn't all to pleased with this but after sitting around for hours and hours, we needed a change of scenery! We put on the closest thing we had to rain coats (my fall/winter coat and Jordan's red "Salvos" jacket), grabbed two flimsy umbrella's and headed to the beach to check out the waves. Although we were completely soaked by the time we got back, it was a fun little adventure and I'm sure we'll end up doing it again!

In other news, I have taken out my Monroe piercing! I have had it in for 2.5 years and I really loved it but I have grown out of it. I am entering a new (more mature) stage of my life and having a facial piercing is probably not the best way to start that stage- I’m sure my family (Grampy, Dad, Mom…etc) will be thrilled! I have had it out for 4 days and already it has closed up greatly and really just looks like a small freckle. I am sure with time, it will be gone (however if it stays as is, I would be fine with that).

Jordan and I have always been thrifty shoppers. However, this has become even more evident throughout that past couple of weeks. As I said before, prices in Australia are really expensive and since Jordan and I want to travel as much as we can while we are here, we want to try and save every penny we can. We have really scouted out the bargain spots including getting our veggies and meat at the local market and going to Aldi’s (the Food Basics equivalent) to buy dairy and miscellaneous products. It takes longer to go to two (sometimes 3 different spots) but it helps us to pinch our pennies! Speaking of pinching our pennies, I left my straightener at home because I was told it wouldn’t work here with the power differences. So, I have been checking out prices at local hair places and have held off until now. The other day I got the brilliant idea to see if the local Salvation Army (Salvos, as they call it here) had any hairdryers and hair straighteners. Luckily, I got both from Salvos for the bargin price of $6!! Oh, did I mention that this price also includes a 21-day warranty on both electronic products? BONUS! Never thought I would buy a hair straightener from Salvation Army but hey, ya gotta do what ya gotta do! Even more of a surprise is that they both actually work really well- a $6 well spent I would say. Mommabear and Ger are probably grinning ear to ear knowing that their ‘thriftiness’ has rubbed off on me!

While we are thrifty and are saving our money, we do splurge on the occasional $10 box of wine (equivalent of 6 bottles- lushes, I know) or $4 bottle of wine (cheaper than juice!). Surprisingly, it’s actually not bad! Apparently we need to only be shopping at Salvos and the Bottlemart and we will save all sorts of money!
As I mentioned earlier, yesterday was Australia Day! The Wollongong Harbour (a few km from our flat) was were the festivities were being held. Tonnes of vendors, rides, concession stands and bands filled the streets and parks. It was just a huge celebration and we had a great day. By the end of the day we were absolutely pooped having walked over 10km in the sticky, humid heat. We finished off the day watching the fireworks from 'our beach' right across the road from our flat. All in all, it was a great day!

               A wee free 'train' ride that Jordan & I took- hey, we need to pinch our pennies! :)

 We had to join in on the Australia festivities- that includes having a pint you know! :)

 On our walk around town we saw this- never actually seen it in person before- beyond hilarious!

That’s all for now folks (as Bugs Bunny would say). Hope everyone back at home is enjoying the snow (or rain as I am hearing)!

All our love,

Kirsten & Jordan

Our First Week in Wollongong, Australia!

                 

             Continued from our last post:

             After a 10.5 hour flight to Sydney, we were anxious to get off the plane and finally stretch our legs. However, to our surprise, we were told to stay seated while two flight attendants “debugged” our plane. The overhead baggage containers on the plane were sprayed with two small aerosol containers which were meant to kill any bugs that were coming from the US.  Despite the fact that this spray was used to KILL any bugs (we found this comical since Australia has THE deadliest bugs/animals/etc), the spray was not supposed to harm humans in anyway...hmmmm. After the “de-bugging” we were allowed off the plane and met with Jordan’s buddy Dave “Gravy” Johnson, who he met in Alberta 4 years ago while living on Sunshine Mountain. Gravy graciously offered to pick us up from the airport and let us crash at his apartment for the night. I had never met Gravy before, nor his girlfriend Chelsea or roommate Zander, but they were so nice and really made us feel welcome! They gave us pointers and helped us map out our route to Wollongong via train the next morning.  One thing that I have to make note of is how Australians drive on “the WRONG side of the road” J. Wow, even after almost week in Australia, I don’t think that I will get used to this any time soon! Simple things like crossing the street (while J-walking of course) are so much harder now since we always look the wrong way! It certainly is going to take us a while to get used to cars coming at us from the other side of the road.

                After spending the night in Sydney with Gravy, Chelsea and Zander, we paid $48 to cab it to Central Train station where we bought our 1.5 hour train tickets to Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia. The train ride was beautiful since it essentially went through the Australian ‘jungle’ while every once and a while popping out at the coast and overlooking the cliffs and beaches. Instantly, Jordan and I were so excited and thoroughly reassured that we made the right decision in picking up our lives and moving to this beautiful country for a year! After getting off the train and making our way to Keiraview Accommodation (the University- run hostel) by foot, lugging hundreds of pounds of luggage up a steep hill, we finally checked in to our (hotel-like) room! Right away we walked 5 minutes down the road and checked out the town that we moved too! Although we were told that Wollongong has a population of 292,000 people and is a steel-town like Hamilton, Ontario (where we previously lived together for 8 months), we felt it was nothing like a large city. Wollongong, to us, feels more like a modern, hotter, more beautiful version of Orillia. It has a small-town feel where Australians are essentially nicer versions of Canadians (with an accent).We immediately felt at home! After making a trip up to the university to enroll in classes and discuss housing options with the accommodation department, I spent 3 hours starring apartments of interest and sending e-mails to make appointments to view the apartments.

 

Living in Australia is very, very expensive including everything from food to accommodation to internet. After checking out a cute, modern apartment one street from the beach, (and deliberating over the expensive price) we decided to sign the lease and go for it- our primary reason being that it is summer right now and besides being at school and work, our main priority is to spend some time at the beach! We signed a 6 month lease and moved in the next morning!

 

 Our Asian-themed apartment is very cozy and we absolutely love it (minus the loft-style bed with little head room…however, Jordan loves it since it is basically a bear’s den with little light which makes for deep, uninterrupted hibernation)!

                                                                               Our dryer!

I have to admit, the loft-style is pretty unique! As I am writing this blog at 10:30 at night, Jordan informs me that he is, in fact, going to hibernate into the bears den since this is the latest we have been up all week! Since we left Canada and have been in these beautiful places I have not wanted to waste a minute of our time and have been up between 5:30 and 7 am every morning. Jordan, to say the least, is not overly thrilled with this decision but goes along with it anyways like a good sport.

Since we have moved into our apartment on the 7^th of January, we have made endless trips into town to buy groceries, bedding (I’m allergic to the down comforter that was provided), cell phone purchases, internet, and our most exciting purchase…2 body boards! The beach, which is an approximate 3 minute walk from our apartment, is absolutely beautiful and we spend as much time as we can there! There are MASSIVE waves every day and after body surfing for the first couple of days, we decided on investing $80 (50% off the regular price) on two body boards which have gotten so much use already! We absolutely love using these boards trying to catch as many waves as we can -with more bails than successful runs! Our shower is filled with sand at the end of every day because we spend so much time in the ocean and on our boards! Both Jordan and I have made comments about how we feel like we are still in the ocean doing back and front flips (from getting hit by waves and tossing us every which way) when we hit the sack at the end of the night! I feel like I’m on a rollercoaster every night when I close my eyes! 

We both have experienced the Australian sunburn already (probably due to the fact that we were both pasty white ghosts when we first got here). I burnt my butt so bad the other day that I could barely sit all night!  Needless to say, the next day we stayed clear of the sun!

On a positive note, Jordan got a job today! Our landlords just opened up a new café (Bar Coco- a desert bar) just around the corner from our apartment and offered Jordan a job. While we were hoping for Jordan to become the newest ‘barista’ in town, since he has no experience in the restaurant business the owners offered him the esteemed position of a ‘dish bitch’ (as Jordan so eloquently describes it).  He is willing to do anything for the next 6 months and getting paid $15/hr cash does make it hard to turn down the job! 

                                 Jordan's off to his job interview!

Jordan’s Insert: Hmmm where to start, Wollongong so far has been a blast; from lying around on the beach to getting absolutely beat in the massive waves while learning to body board. The first large wave that I actually caught I was so stoked that I was screaming with excitement when the wave broke throwing my legs over my head (full blown scorpion) and ramming water down my throat. When I finally stood up I was choking on sea water and on the verge of throwing up. Needless to say I was loving it and began swimming out to Kirsten only to find her laughing hysterically at my bail. Not too long after the same thing happened to Kirsten and we enjoyed a good laugh. This has happened to us many times now but we are both starting to get the hang of it. When we are not acting like a bunch of beach bums we are out exploring the city. Wollongong has a beautiful harbour with two large lighthouses surrounded on either side by the two never ending public beaches. Oddly enough, as large as these beaches are, the public swimming zone (monitored by life guards) couldn’t be any smaller. Although the location of the safe zone changes daily due to the tides it ranges from 50-75m wide. It is rather funny to see these expansive beaches and then an extremely crowded section of the beach where people are allowed to swim. Outside of the flags is the designated surfing area which keeps the swimmers out of their way. When we arrived in Sydney Gravy mentioned that the summer here is their shark season and that due to the uncommon “cold” weather they were experiencing the sharks were moving in toward the beach to feed. Of course this freaked both Kirsten and I out. Reassuringly, Gravy who has lived in Australia his whole life has never seen a shark at the beach before. To monitor this unusual season they have hired two bi-planes to fly quite low over the beach daily monitoring the coast. Now that I have completely freaked out my mother about the ocean I will sign off and leave you to continue reading Kirsten’s portion of the blog.   

I start school on January 16^th (this coming Monday) and so I am looking forward to relaxing the next couple of days before my life gets super hectic.  We’d like to thank everyone for all the congratulations and well wishes about our engagement!  We couldn’t be happier about it and it means a lot to have so much love and support surrounding us! 

 That's all for now! Hope you enjoyed this blog!

  

Love,

K & J

 

NYE in Hawaii & Our First Couple of Days in Australia!

Well, where to start? Firstly, I apologize for the lack of blog’s lately; it’s been a hectic week and a half! It’s great to hear many of you sending us notes saying that you can’t wait to read our newest blog! Well, the most important and exciting news we can share with you all is that…WE’RE ENGAGED!! J After 7 years of dating, Jordan popped the question in Hawaii on New Year’s Eve day at a beautiful private waterfall that we found. Since I know you all are wondering how it happened, here’s how! While in Maui on our 5-day mini-vacation, we decided to drive the “Road to Hana”. This road trip took us roughly 11 hours and was worth every minute of it! We set out at 5:30 am and after a 25 minute delay because one of the fellow backpackers parked behind us (and therefore we had to knock on some doors to get him to move his car) we were on the road. Our first stop was alongside the road to snap some pictures of some (what looked like professional) surfers riding these incredibly big waves. Were they ever impressive! 

 We continued on and stopped at “Twin Falls” which is a ‘touristy’ stop with a couple of little waterfalls. Little did I know that Jordan was scoping out spots to pop the question with the ring in his shorts pocket!

 After deciding that these waterfalls were neat but we knew we would see better ones, we drove on until we saw a huge waterfall in the distance. Jordan was DETERMINED to get to it and so we climbed over a watershed and into the jungle to get to this waterfall. After a 20 minute hike and both running shoes being completely dunked in the water, we were there. This waterfall was totally stunning and had beautiful pools surrounding it.

 I was sitting in awe looking at the waterfall when I turned around to face Jordan (who was sitting just below me) and there he was holding up the most beautiful ring! It’s actually quite funny because he asked me to marry him and at first I didn’t respond to his question because I just kept saying “Oh my goodness, oh my goodness”! He had to ask me twice before I actually replied with a “YES, OF COURSE!!”.  It was something straight out of a storybook and I’ll tell you, you couldn’t wipe the smile off of both of our faces! It couldn’t have been more perfect! 

We both decided after to swim in the little water-pool at the foot of the waterfall. Well, I would love to tell you that we jumped in, stood underneath it and loved every minute of it but in reality…IT WAS FREEZING!! Determined to say that I swam in a natural pool, I (after about 15 minutes of slowing lowering myself into the water) did a couple of laps and was out in a jiffy! Jordan made it to just about his waist and that was all he could take. I was rather impressed with the effort since I, the water lover, even found it almost unbearable! We decided that the numbing effect should only last song long and hopped out and hiked back to the car-not before completely “muddying” (?) up our shoes! Needless to say, Jordan’s proposal was certainly the highlight of our trip!

As we continued our drive, complete with 600 hair-pin turns and a single lane road on the side of a giant cliff, I actually began to feel nauseous because for the majority of the drive I had my head down looking at my ring! The trip really was the most beautiful drive we’ve ever experienced and we highly recommend it to anyone travelling to Maui. Jordan’s parents are actually headed to Hawaii in March and we can’t wait to share with them our experiences of Maui. The most beautiful part of the drive was actually past the town of Hana. The insurance on rental cars is void if you go past Hana (because of the steep cliffs and rocky roads). Since the weather was beautiful, we decided to carefully drive on and it was worth every minute.

Jordan’s Insert: Just past the town of Hana, Kirsten and I were still loving the drive but were looking for another attraction to pull over and stretch our legs. To our surprise we see a hand painted sign that said “Lava tube next left”. As we mentioned all of the 600+ turns were hairpin so it didn’t allow much warning. As we came around the corner I swerved quickly down the rough road. About a mile down the road we turn up what looks to be someone’s driveway and discover the Lava tube. Here sat a very charismatic owner who instantly talked us into paying $12 each to tour the tubes. Kirsten and I reluctantly paid the man and said to each other “I hope this is worth $24”. We head on down the path which leads us to a winding stair case into a cave. 

Once we enter the cave it is literally pitch dark.  Equipped with flash lights we both head on through this incredible cave system full of stalactites and stalagmites that were unlike any that I have seen before. These ones looked like they were made of chocolate fudge if you can believe it. About a kilometer through the cave we come to a massive bolder lodged in the rock and we crawl underneath it which brings us to the end of the excursion. Unfortunately the man did not own the land any further then this which meant we had to turn back and hit the road again. Needless to say it was worth $24 dollars for us nature buffs (mark you will love this!).

After 7.5 hours in the car, stopping every once and a while to take in the scenery, we found a little farm that sold local fruit, vegetables and coffee. Since we had been up for so long, the coffee was much needed. The13-acre farm was run by 13 people who bunked in tree houses and worked to provide the town with fresh food. It was very cool to see and we instantly thought of Jordan’s Aunt Cathy and Uncle Greg who live in Tweed, Ontario and have a very whimsical garden equipped with a “Zen Den”. You guys would have loved it there!

After a few days on the road visiting Haleakala Crater and driving the “Road to Hana”, we decided to head back to our beach that we found. Driving out to the beach we saw at least 30 whale spouts blowing water up into the air. It was by far the coolest thing to see! The whales were just rolling in the water and every now and then you could see a tail come splashing down or a fin gliding through the water. Keep in mind this was at least a half mile away but it was still so great to see! 

Our 5 days in Hawaii were absolutely amazing despite the fact that my computer got a major virus on our last day there. After dropping it off a tech-shop for the entire day and picking it up at 10pm that night, it was fixed and we were back on our lucky strike. Our flight flew out the next morning and since Hawaiian Airlines allows for 70lb bags travelling to Australia, I jammed as much as I could into my suitcase (so I ONLY had to carry a 35 pound backpack on my back, a 20 pound knapsack on my front and drag my 70lb suitcase behind me) J.  Our first flight was a mini 30 minute flight in which we were upgraded to exit seats for the 2^nd time this trip! To our utter surprise and excitement, the 10.5 hour flight from Honolulu to Sydney we also got to sit in exit rows! 

 

We could stretch our legs out in front of us and still had 2 feet in front of us…it was pure luxury. 

We HIGHLY recommend flying Hawaiian airlines. It was by far the best flight I have ever been on equipped with free wine (bonus!), a delicious meal consisting of chicken curry, broccoli, salad, lime/raspberry cheesecake and guava juice, as well as unlimited snacks (chips and pound cake) and a ham/cheese croissant! The only downfall of the flight (other than the fact the Jordan was becoming quite congested) was the fact that it was FREEZING due to sitting right by the door. After grabbing a couple extra blankets and putting my feet on my back pack (and therefore off the chilly floor) we were warm and cozy and ended up getting a few hours of sleep.

The time change between Hawaii and Canada is five hours (Canada being 5 hours ahead) and so when we arrived in Sydney, we only subtracted two hours from Hawaii time and skipped a whole day. For example, we arrived (Hawaii time) at 9:30pm on Tuesday January 3^rd but in Australia time it was actually 7:30 pm on Wednesday January 4^th- we had lost a whole day! The Hawaii stop-over certainly made the world of a difference in terms of getting used to the time change!

                Since this is a massively long post, I’m going to end here and will continue the next blog starting with arriving in Australia! All in all, our mini-vacation in Maui was absolutely amazing and we couldn’t be happier about getting engaged!! Our next blog will be up soon!

Happy New Year!

 Kirsten & Jordan