It’s strange and slightly disconcerting going from a very
mild winter with relatively little snow to sunny Australia: 80 degrees and
humid. With the exception of
learning how to ski on Christmas, winter in a conventional sense barely existed
for me. I can’t complain, however,
because I learned how to surf the other day (I’ll explain more later).
It’s hard to believe that I’ve been in Australia for more
than a week now. It feels like
it’s been months, yet sometimes it feels like only a few hours. Time is strange here...I never know
what day of the week it is or the time of day (I’ve changed time zones more
times than I can keep track of since I left Massachusetts).
I flew from Logan to Dallas two Sundays ago on January 29th. That was only a one hour time
difference; it involved four hours in a tiny plane in which I was squished up
against a random stranger (aisle seats rock). Having just flow to Dublin over Thanksgiving break, I had
forgotten how cramped domestic flights are. I met two of my program-mates in Boston and we flew together
all the way with a brief layover in Dallas-Fort Worth. I had been mentally preparing for a
staggering 24 hours in a plane but was pleasantly surprised when we landed in
Brisbane only about 15 hours later.
I had slept sprawled out for a good eight hours since the two seats to my right were
empty. The two-level Boeing 747
was friendly to me that day (or days? At some point over the Pacific, we
crossed the International Date Line and my sense of time and place was obscured
further). I finished a Dean Koontz
book that I had been in the process of reading for years, studied my Australian
maps, and was fed a better-than-mediocre airplane breakfast just hours before
landing.
Arriving in Brisbane was a relatively calm experience. Immediately after exiting the plane,
the humidity hit us like a ton of bricks: the air was sticky and heavy with
moisture. When we stepped outside,
the atmosphere, air temperature/quality, and vegetation were vaguely reminiscent
of Florida. After a slight scare
that my second checked bag had gotten lost somewhere between Logan and
Brisbane, we retrieved our luggage and met two more group-mates in the
airport. The five of us were
staying at the airport hotel “Novotel,” which wasn’t even located on the
airport grounds, but rather a ten-minute drive outside the city. The hotel was very contemporary and
modern looking, angular with everything in the rooms white. It was almost sterile feeling. We were glad to have 4.5 star
accommodations for the first night, however, knowing we’d soon be downgrading
to hostels and tents in the coming days.
We were determined to fight off the yawns and the urge to
nap with the goal of at least staying up until seven or eight that
evening. Surprisingly, we were
less jet lagged than I expected, though I heard the flight back to the States
is much worse. For the first day
or two, I still did not feel like I was in Australia; it was too surreal. It honestly felt a lot like home,
especially in the airport and hotel.
The Australian accent, however, is the dead give away.
We spent the day walking around Brisbane, which is the
capital of Queensland, the northeastern-most state in Australia (home to the
Great Barrier Reef). The
architecture in Brisbane had a very colonial feel with many mixed-use buildings
(an aged building labeled the National Treasury was actually a casino??). Bill Bryson acutely notes how Australia
is an interesting mix between the UK and the US. I could absolutely feel it...it somehow felt like home but
also vaguely European. The sun was
shining and the city was bustling.
I felt like we spent most of the day moving from one eating
establishment to the next – a restaurant to a coffee shop to a bar. We even found a “fake beach” in the
middle of the city. Located near
the river, it was a cement pool surrounded by sand: an urban oasis. We dipped our feet and would have spent
the entire afternoon there if we hadn’t felt the need to see more of the city.
Beautiful colonial-esque architecture
The "Fake Beach" in downtown Brisbane
The Australian Ibis bird..peskier than a seagull!
A German-themed farmers' market downtown
We ended up eating dinner back at the hotel – three dinners
of un-American sized portions without drinks cost us $76. This is one aspect of Australia that I
should have been more prepared for: the general cost of living, especially with
regard to food. I was prematurely excited that the exchange rate between the U.S. and Australia dollar was close
to 1 to 1, forgetting that the cost of food and other products can be 2x higher
in Australia. Living here is
certainly testing my budgeting skills, as a bottle of sun block can cost as
much as $20.
After checking out of our hotel, we met the rest of the
group in the airport. Most of them
had landed that same morning; I couldn’t fathom their exhaustion. It was exciting getting to meet
everyone, but also overwhelming. I
was just starting to feel comfortable in our group of five and suddenly 19 other
people were thrown into the mix. I
learned names slowly and personalities even slower. We spent one more night in Brisbane at a hostel. It was my first time staying in a
hostel and it was an interesting experience. We were bunked in rooms of six and several rooms shared a
bathroom with only three showers, two sinks, and two stalls. The hostel was naturally filled with
other tourists, young people, and backpackers from all over the world. We encountered some entertaining
individuals that night at Karaoke in the hostel bar. We all got Thai food as a group and spent time getting to
know each other, as well as the Academic Director and the Program Assistant,
two of the coolest guys I've ever met.
We departed for New South Wales the next day – we were
headed to Seven Mile Beach near Linnaeus, just south of Byron Bay for
orientation. It was a two and a
half hour bus ride through the countryside, which was a refreshing break from
the busyness of Brisbane. Driving
through the nature preserve that we were staying at, we saw a wallaby hanging
out in the field – my first sighting of an ‘exotic’ Australian animal. We stayed at “the Crab,” which referred
to the various decks and wings of the building that were claw-like. We camped outside but had access to a
flush toilet, running water, a full kitchen, and a great room for
lectures. This was not camping as
I had imagined it, as I had images of Adirondack Adventure dancing in my head:
leave no trace camping that promoted the “dig a hole” method.
The area was beyond beautiful. We were within a five minute walk to the beach, of which we
took advantage. We took turns
cooking and cleaning in small groups, had a swim test, went over general health
and safety info (which included snake bites and preventing drowning in a rip),
and even got to play Australian jeopardy (the only contribution I made was
remembering that 100% of the Australian population voted in last year’s
election because voting is legally mandatory, SCORE).
We woke up at 5 AM the next day and took a bus to Byron Bay
where we walked up a trail to get to the Lighthouse. This was our first class meeting, which involved watching
the sun rise and learning about the history and culture of the area with the
goal of fostering a better “sense of place.” Later in the day, we heard a lecture on climate and coastal
processes, which I found really interesting, as it echoed much of the info I
learned in my last semester’s geology class. Then we went into the field (aka went to the beach) to
observe the processes first hand and to look at some of the coastal
vegetation. At times and
especially at first, it was difficult to remember that we are in Australia for
academic purposes. The beach can
be a bit distracting and tempting, particularly to students who are used to a
long snowy winter at school.
Byron Bay Light House
Watching the sunrise over the Pacific from the eastern most point of Australia
On our way to learning about geocoastal processes in the field!
Really cool vegetation, these were trees with pine-cone like branches that spit seeds out (Dad, you would have appreciated this)
Rainbows and smiles after the storm
We had our first introduction to Environmental Ethics, had
our first sharing circle for which everyone went around and talked about why
they were here, what got them to their current place in the environmental
movement, etc. It was exciting and
enlightening to listen to everyone share his or her personal story and
experiences. Many of us have more
in common than we might have initially thought.
One of the most exciting parts of orientation was certainly
learning how to surf. We went to
the Black Dog surf shop/school in Byron where we met our two instructors and
the photographer. After splitting
up into two groups of twelve, my group hit the beach. Carrying the surfboards was awkward and we must have looked
like quite the American sight with our matching O’Neill and Rip Curl wetsuit tops. Our instructors were hilarious and
great at their job; they taught us safety, basic technique on how to stand up,
and soon we were riding waves (baby ones...). We didn’t learn how to paddle the first day, as we were
pushed into the waves, but standing up on the third try was still an exciting
feat. After that, it was all
smiles. Fortunately, everyone in
both groups managed to ride a few in.
One of my favorite pictures so far
Orientation was wrapping up, as we did a few more
activities/had a few more lectures (e.g. comparing Australian and American
culture and Sense of Place). Then
we finally moved into our apartments in Byron just a couple of days ago. This little coastal town is great –
filled with the cutest shops, a plethora of restaurants, and of course tons of
bars and clubs. We’re only two
blocks away from the beach and two roommates and I share our own bathroom and a
full kitchen. I think we can get
used to this!
While it’s been somewhat exhausting to constantly be
expected to socialize and being unable to contact people at home due to Internet
problems, I recognize that this is going to be one of the most rewarding and
educational experiences of my life.
In fact, we’re kayaking tomorrow in the Brunswick Estuary – never a
boring day in Aussieland!
