Happy Halloween everyone! I had a great time today and I hope everyone else did too!
Tomorrow I’m starting the third week of my internship at a non-profit organization and I love it so far. I’m learning so much about the non-profit industry and it’s pretty exciting! I’ve already learned about web design, marketing, PR and fundraising...all stuff that can help me find a job when I come back to California! My coworkers are all awesome people who are very willing to help me out if I have questions or problems, and I even get my own office! I’ve never had my own office before, it’s so awesome. Granted, it’s also the storage room, but it’s an office and I’ll take it! :)
I couldn’t make up a more bizarre location for my work if I tried. It’s basically in the middle of nowhere surrounded by trees and grass. Because there is so much trees and grass, it’s the perfect habitat for one of the most deadly spiders in the entire world called the funnel web spider. They are ridiculously huge and we killed one in our office the other day. We also have spiders that live in the trees and fall onto people’s heads as they walk by! Every single tree I pass, I look up haha. Those ones aren’t dangerous, but who wants huge spiders on their heads?!
The most interesting part of my work’s location is that it’s next to a mental institution and the patients are free to walk around…I’ve seen some very odd things. We also have a mental institution for the criminally insane, but that’s down at the other side of the street and they are locked up of course. :)
One thing that I can say is that I am never bored! And I really do love my work so everything is completely worth it.
I think I mentioned in a previous blog post that I live in Little Italy…today there was a huge Italian festival right outside of my door and on my street. I literally walked out my front door and there it was. Hundreds and hundreds of people have been here today and there is authentic Italian food, clothing, music and even Italian books. I love stuff like this, I thought it was really cool! I spent the day out in the sun with some friends and eating lots of different Italian foods.
I’m going to be moving out of this apartment within the next few weeks to be closer to my work…But I’m going to be moving to the city, which will be so much fun! And it’s for the same price as I’m paying now so I think it’ll be worth it. It takes me an hour and a half to get to work, so this will help a lot. We’ll see what happens.
Lots more holidays coming up and of course I wish I could be home with family, but at least I have friends here to celebrate with. I have two options for thanksgiving; I will either make dinner with my American friends here, or I’ll make a Thanksgiving dinner for everyone in the hostel. No one at my hostel has ever celebrated Thanksgiving before, and they’ve only seen it in the movies so I thought it would be cool to celebrate with them. They keep asking me tons of questions about it.
Not sure what I’ll do, I’m just glad I have amazing friends here to celebrate with!
Miss everyone back home, hope all is well.
Matt
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Monday, October 11, 2010
Random Experiences and Kings Cross
Hi everyone! I’ve been here in Sydney for about 3 weeks now, and it’s been amazing so far. I’ve made some great friends and I’m loving life. I finally saw a Kangaroo (and ate one), ate a meat pie, and was called love by some lady. Now I feel like I'm living like a real Australian!
I still have to try vegemite but I'm avoiding it like the plague. One whiff of that stuff and I was not a fan...but I will force myself to try it before I leave for sure. Yuck.
There are little things here and there that have been hard to adjust to, but overall it’s been surprisingly easy. A few minor things with language have tripped me up, such as here they call Rugby football. But I also live with foreign students who call soccer football. And I call the NFL football…That tends to get pretty confusing when no one knows which sport someone the other person is talking about!
I also have trouble passing people on the left side when walking. It’s something that I never really had to think of before, but in the U.S. we generally pass on the right. I’ve almost been in quite a number of collisions here because I walk on the wrong side.
I’ve also had some issues with buses here, but the issues are oddly hilarious. Before I got to Australia, a number of people told me to avoid an area called Kings Cross because it’s known to be dangerous. Well about a week ago I told some people I would go to a club with them in the city. Little did I know that the club was directly in the middle of Kings Cross. Oops.
The first sign that things may not go so well that night was when city workers came on board the bus and demanded to see everyone’s bus pass. Being new to Australia, I had the wrong pass and the guy said that there was a fine of $100. Luckily, he was a pretty understanding guy and let me off without a fine.
About five minutes later the bus is about to reach Kings Cross and I see two guys with their pants down to their ankles being searched by police. All of a sudden one of the guys ran for it into the middle of traffic and was chased by about six cops. Eventually one caught up with him and knocked the crap out of him. Someone's glasses flew across the road although I'm not really sure who's glasses. “Oh” I thought. “This is why I’m not supposed to go to Kings Cross.” When we arrived in King’s Cross, there were drug dealers and prostitutes all around us. Luckily the night ended up going pretty well though as we were able to avoid all the dodgy business going on around us and have a good time at a club. But I should probably look for different clubs in the future.
Then yesterday, on a separate bus, some goofball kept pressing the stop button but wouldn’t get off when the doors opened. Not such a big deal to me, but apparently it touched a nerve with the bus driver. The driver started screaming at everyone and then he refused to stop at any bus stop except the very last one. This was a bus completely full of people and many of them were pretty angry since they needed to get off at earlier stops. At this point people were screaming and cussing at the bus driver, who was screaming back and speeding like crazy. At one point we ran a red light and almost got into an accident, all the while people were yelling at each other. Eventually we got to the last bus stop and he let us out. I miss my car haha.
Other than that ridiculousness, I’m doing pretty well. I start my internship next Monday and I’m really excited to get to work. I think I can do a lot of good work for this organization, so I can’t wait to get started. I might need to get a second job fairly quickly because of how expensive it is here. Minimum wage here is $15 an hour (!) and the Australian dollar is worth about the same as the American dollar at the moment so I will definitely be making good money even if I work some BS job to pay the bills. We’ll see what happens.
Also, I may need to move apartments fairly quickly. I love where I live right now, but it’s over an hour by bus from my internship…I’m not sure it’s worth it. On the other hand, the place where my internship is located is in the middle of nowhere and it’ll be really hard to meet people…I’ve got a lot to think about!
Here are some more pictures I’ve taken in Sydney.
Another Sydney Opera House Picture
Random picture I like
Reid House!!!!!!!!!!
This is just outside my front door. So much to eat!
This is a bunch of people I live with in Georgia house.
Miss everyone back home, write me messages!
Matt
I still have to try vegemite but I'm avoiding it like the plague. One whiff of that stuff and I was not a fan...but I will force myself to try it before I leave for sure. Yuck.
There are little things here and there that have been hard to adjust to, but overall it’s been surprisingly easy. A few minor things with language have tripped me up, such as here they call Rugby football. But I also live with foreign students who call soccer football. And I call the NFL football…That tends to get pretty confusing when no one knows which sport someone the other person is talking about!
I also have trouble passing people on the left side when walking. It’s something that I never really had to think of before, but in the U.S. we generally pass on the right. I’ve almost been in quite a number of collisions here because I walk on the wrong side.
I’ve also had some issues with buses here, but the issues are oddly hilarious. Before I got to Australia, a number of people told me to avoid an area called Kings Cross because it’s known to be dangerous. Well about a week ago I told some people I would go to a club with them in the city. Little did I know that the club was directly in the middle of Kings Cross. Oops.
The first sign that things may not go so well that night was when city workers came on board the bus and demanded to see everyone’s bus pass. Being new to Australia, I had the wrong pass and the guy said that there was a fine of $100. Luckily, he was a pretty understanding guy and let me off without a fine.
About five minutes later the bus is about to reach Kings Cross and I see two guys with their pants down to their ankles being searched by police. All of a sudden one of the guys ran for it into the middle of traffic and was chased by about six cops. Eventually one caught up with him and knocked the crap out of him. Someone's glasses flew across the road although I'm not really sure who's glasses. “Oh” I thought. “This is why I’m not supposed to go to Kings Cross.” When we arrived in King’s Cross, there were drug dealers and prostitutes all around us. Luckily the night ended up going pretty well though as we were able to avoid all the dodgy business going on around us and have a good time at a club. But I should probably look for different clubs in the future.
Then yesterday, on a separate bus, some goofball kept pressing the stop button but wouldn’t get off when the doors opened. Not such a big deal to me, but apparently it touched a nerve with the bus driver. The driver started screaming at everyone and then he refused to stop at any bus stop except the very last one. This was a bus completely full of people and many of them were pretty angry since they needed to get off at earlier stops. At this point people were screaming and cussing at the bus driver, who was screaming back and speeding like crazy. At one point we ran a red light and almost got into an accident, all the while people were yelling at each other. Eventually we got to the last bus stop and he let us out. I miss my car haha.
Other than that ridiculousness, I’m doing pretty well. I start my internship next Monday and I’m really excited to get to work. I think I can do a lot of good work for this organization, so I can’t wait to get started. I might need to get a second job fairly quickly because of how expensive it is here. Minimum wage here is $15 an hour (!) and the Australian dollar is worth about the same as the American dollar at the moment so I will definitely be making good money even if I work some BS job to pay the bills. We’ll see what happens.
Also, I may need to move apartments fairly quickly. I love where I live right now, but it’s over an hour by bus from my internship…I’m not sure it’s worth it. On the other hand, the place where my internship is located is in the middle of nowhere and it’ll be really hard to meet people…I’ve got a lot to think about!
Here are some more pictures I’ve taken in Sydney.
Another Sydney Opera House Picture
Random picture I like
Reid House!!!!!!!!!!
This is just outside my front door. So much to eat!
This is a bunch of people I live with in Georgia house.
Miss everyone back home, write me messages!
Matt
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