Matt in Sydney: 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.