Orientation & New Friends 2

Continued Post:

Any way, Orienation-schmorientation stuff - lets jump to the good stuff: folks I met! Folks from all over! Germany, Greece, UK, US, Canada, Switzerland, Spain, Italy, more Germans, lots of Germans (okay with me because I'm taking German 101 here this semester for fun - they can help me practice!). I met Ingeborg from Norway, randomly sat with Eric (the other Purdue Study Abroad Exchange student here with me - we met before we left the US), so that was fun. Eric made friends and introduced me to some guys he met at the YHA he was staying at: Phillip and Fe (both German) and Mike (Canadian). It's been a lot of fun so far - lots of "hi's," "what's your name's," "where are you from's," haha!

After Orientation I hopped online at the library for a bit, printed off the photo of the koala that I'm planning to sketch, and took care of a few other things like eating my meal of the day (until I hit the grocery store I've been eating mostly just once a day - very odd for me, the one who has a snack on her at all times).

So Thursday was Valentine's Day and me and the folks I met through Orientation went to see Jumper since it wasn't like we had dates to worry about for the evening, being miles away from our beaus and such. I thought the movie was great; it had a neat idea and some cool effects. I especially liked the soundtrack. I think they could have gone into Samuel L. Jackson's character and the history of the "jumper" a bit more, but I still really liked it. After wards we looked for a bar to hang out at but everything was too ritzy for our current attire so we called it a night, saving our party for Friday night.

Friday morning I went back to campus to enroll and add/drop some units (aka courses). Jumped online for a while. It was great to chat and Skype with Adam. (Miss you, babe!) We caught up with each other and talked about random stuff like how to say Mooloolaba (ma-loo-lah-bah) and photos and Aussie rock/pop bands like INXS, Counting Crows and, my personal favorite, Kylie Minogue! I missed my parents and Sam; bummed about that since I'd not talked to them online in a couple days, but they are busy getting ready to take Sam to State this weekend! Best of luck, Sam! Rock the mat!

I ran around the city center after chatting with Adam. Tried to get my phone unlocked so I could use it with an Aussie network but the AT&T lock is different - something - I dunno. So they couldn't get it and I guess if I don't hear back from my Mom about it I'll just buy an Optus or Vodafone over here. Checked out some clothing boutiques; thought I'd try to get something with an Australian flare to it but everything is itsy bitsy! A medium here is a small back home and I typically wear mediums back home and of course here I've not seen anything large, ha. My luck. I'm sure I'll find something. If I can find an Aussie version of Charlotte Russe I'll be pretty happy.

Bought some new Australian candy today: a Cadbury Cherry Ripe bar. It was delicious! Dark chocolate covering some creamy coconut and real cherry chunks! Yum! They have Cadbury goodies EVERYWHERE! All kinds of stuff I've never heard or seen before; they've got so much more than their cream-filled eggs!



It's Friday night and I'm about to head out with a big group to hit the city and find something fun to do. We had a girl move in today: Mya (can't remember where she's from), and Nick is back (he's been living here but was traveling) - he's from New York. Oh, Ian's twin brother Neil and his roommate Brody are coming, too.

It's signing off for me! Sounds like I might be going to the beach tomorrow at Gold Coast with Mya and some of her Swedish friends. I'll write and post more soon!

Okay, it's Saturday now; decided against going to Gold Coast this weekend - wanted to take it easy. I have a few photos from last night I thought I'd post up for your viewing pleasure:

A shot of the living room with some of the guys hanging around. The apartment was packed last night (thought not so much depicted in the photo below) with everyone and a few friends from downstairs and some met through orientation (the place was so empty last week compared to how it is now!):



Irish Murphy's, where we went last night:



Sarah:



Me & Judith (she lives downstairs, another German):



Mike, Fumah, me, & Sarah:



Eric & Ingeborg (I love her expression, haha!):



The group (wrapping from left, back and behind to the right): Mike, Stephanie, Eric, Sarah, Fumah, Ingeborg and yours truly:



It was a really fun night, full of getting to know each other and just having a good time out and about the city center of Brisbane. When I got in last night I read some of the Black Dahlia (it took me about 30 pages to get into it, but now it's become a really great read), then hit the hay. Slept in this morning and came to the library to hop online for a bit. My Mom sent me the code to have my BlackJack unlocked so I can use it with an Aussie network now! Yay! I'm SO happy about that! Then I'm meeting Ingeborg for lunch! Hopefully I'll get some groceries and start my koala sketch later tonight. Tomorrow is laundry and maybe going to the Andy Worhol exhibit at the Gallery of Modern Art (aka GOMA) if they're open on Sundays.

Check back again soon!

-Amanda

Oh, I spotted a pink Frangipani grove on a new route to the library from my apartment - they're such lovely trees and have a wonderful fragrance to them:



PS - I was brushing my teeth the other night and this huge bug flew right by my ear. They have flying huge cockroach things here! It was pretty cool so I snapped a photo of it. I tried to get the bathroom door knob in the photo to give perspective of the bug's size but it's not really doing the bug any justice:



PS again - I just saw that Interpol (a new favorite band of mine) is playing in Brisbane on the 19th! I checked ticket information online - it's a little pricey with a ticket at $68 now - but I saw that Russel Peters is coming, too, for $79 a ticket! I think I'm going to get a group to go see him! If you didn't know, he's a comedian; I've seen a show of his and it's hilarious!