Beached As!
Monday, January 31, 2011
This is some funny video my program leader guys told us about. It's sweeeeet as!
I’m In Love Alri-i-i-ight With My Crazy Beautiful Life.
Happy first day of work to me!!
I was nervous about it for a bit. I didn’t know what I would be expected to do. We start at 8 am and go until 430 ish. I got my lovely knakis on and my new Tassie Zoo shirt and my surprisingly comfy work/hiking boots. I’m really glad I got the boots. We do a ton of walking. Also, the khakis are really comfy. I’m mostly just really comfy. Ah except for the fact that it’s raining quite a bit, so I’m pretty soaked through. I pretty much look like a wet dog. Probably worse. Anyway, so we get into the zoo through the back, which is pretty cool and makes me feel special. Ha. So Justine and I walked up through the zoo to the front to find Rob, but he wasn’t in the gift shop area. A guy in there sent us to the staff room where they do all the food stuff and what not. So we headed over there and ran into three of the people who work at the zoo as well. Aaron boy, Aaron/Erin girl (I have no idea who to spell either of their names, and Cody (I think). They seem nice enough. I’ve spent some time with both Aarons doing some stuff around the zoo. Rob showed up like a minute later ready to work. There was a bunch of fruit and greens. I got to cut some up for the monkeys. Rob took us to each monkey cage and showed up how he feeds them and stuff. He let us into like three of the monkey cages, as well! It was so cool! I don’t really remember the order of everything, but I did heaps (they say “heaps” instead of “a lot”) of really awesome stuff.
So we did the monkey stuff. We gave a lot of the animals fresh water. Most of the birds already had fresh water, so we did the wombat, the rabbits, the sheep, the goats, the cows, the pony, the alpacas, wallabies, etc. I got to hop into a lot of the animals enclosures. Like a big bird one, and there was a cute bird named Sweet Pea that likes getting a scratch so she let me pet her. Wombats apparently really love sweet potatoes, so girl Aaron let me take one into the wombats area and feed her. She came up to me and put her big paws on my leg and let me pet her. Talk about amazing. Rob had to chop up some road kill wallabies and roos to feed the like 20 Devils they have there and the Australian Dogs, so we watched him as he put dead wallabies and roos on a stump and use a big cleaver to chop them into pieces. We took those pieces and fed them to the Devils. The ones we fed are some of the breeding ones so they aren’t on display in the actual zoo.
Side note: I really need to stop saying “cool” so much. I say it heaps. Justine just came in cause Rob stopped by to talk about some internet stuff and since I’m in my room listening to music and writing this, I didn’t know. So she was telling me what he was saying, and I kept responding with “Oh okay that’s cool” and “Cool!” and “That would be cool.” I need a new vocabulary.
Okay so yeah I fed some of the breeding Tassie Devils. It was so fun. They can smell the meat, so they come out of their little hiding places and run up to the gate and some of them try climbing up the gate or running into it because they want the meat so badly. Some of them will growl and stuff. Some are really timid, too. They wouldn’t come out of their hiding spots, so we would throw the meat really close to their little caves and they still wouldn’t come out until we left or something. Most of their enclosures have about three of them in there, so we would put multiple wallaby legs or whatever in there. It’s really funny because all three will go for the same piece of meat instead of going after all the pieces. It’s like the find it necessary to fight. Also, Tassie Devils are really freaking crazy, they eat every part of whatever wallaby part you give them. It’s a little weird to hear them crunching away on the bones like it’s candy.. I found out that their jaw strength is the second strongest of any land mammal, Hyena being first, and it’s just below the strength of a freaking croc’s jaw strength. These guys are really small, like the size of a large cat or something and they could rip your arm off. How insane is that!? It’s really sad though, they only live for about six years.. They are absolutely fascinating creatures. I love them.
So we also tagged along with girl and boy Aaron to watch them feed different stuff. Girl Aaron fed the quolls. They eat this awful mixture of food. I had to mix grated carrots, sweet potatoes, and apple (Who the heck has even grated an apple before? Well, I have now. My skills are expanding rapidly here. Apple grating, meat throwing, wombat feeding, what’s next!?) along with eggs (Not cooked eggs, mind you, just eggs. Snatched out of a carton and thrown into a bucket with the grated stuff.) and some meat and like bird seed looking stuff. How totally random is that, eh? I mixed it all up. With my hands. It was nasty. I went with girl Aaron to move some birds to different cages. We moved this pink Cockatoo named Dolly who is actually a boy Cockatoo. Ha. A ferocious little bugger took his place. He was another Cockatoo, but he’s white and he’s a meanie. He does talk though. It’s funny walking around the park and you hear all these random birds saying stuff like “Hello boy!” and “Polly want a cracker!” and “Puss puss puss.” There’s a cat that walks around the zoo, hence the puss thing, I guess. Maybe it’s just a weird freaking bird. I also got to feed a penguin! The little Fairy penguins, which they call little blue penguins now or something. Only one of them would eat from me because I’m new.. Some day they will love me and all eat from my hands! The big macaw, Marigold, doesn’t like me. I guess she doesn’t like anyone really at first. I went into her cage with her food. She can say cashew because she gets them to eat and likes them. So I went in her cage and girl Aaron told me to stick out my arm and told Marigold to hop on, but Marigold mostly want to snap at me. So I set her food down on the other side of the cage and she flew at my head. Ha. It was a bit unnerving, but she will be fine with me soon hopefully. Justine and I had to clean out the Koala’s cage. The Koala is SO BIG! Apparently his name is Hitler, but they call him Billy for obvious reasons. Man oh man that Koala poops a lot, I mean heaps. Ha. I think that’s most of the cool stuff I did for the day. It was way awesome. I can’t believe I’ve been allowed to do all of this. I never thought I would be climbing into animals enclosures at a zoo, and it would be legal. Nor did I think that I would be feeding any of them. I think it might get a bit monotonous feeding the animals every day for ten weeks, but I can’t believe the amazing experience that I’ll get from all of this!
I forgot to mention that we missed some stuff when we were exploring the zoo the other day. There is in fact a reptile house, as well as some fishes. They have a lung fish. Lung fish are weirdos. They are building this new area for their freshwater croc and gator because they are getting a saltwater croc, and they are going to put all those fish in that area as well. Anyway, they don’t have a ton of reptiles. The zoo is pretty small so that’s not surprising, in fact it’s mostly just a little wildlife park, I guess. I think it’s main point is for the Tassie Devil breeding program. So yeah. Anyway, they have a few Tiger snakes and like one other small ish snake. There are a few lizards that I believe are some sort of skinks. Now the real treat is the two massive snakes that they have. One extremely large python and a boa constrictor, which Rob took out and let me touch! I think the python was much too big and powerful for anyone to take out without seriously fearing for their lives. He had a shed skin in his cage and it was so big, I couldn’t even believe it.
I just remembered a funny story from today. So we were at the Mandrils cage, those are monkeys. Rob was talking about how if you go up to the cage, the smaller Mandril will come over and stick his belly against the fence for a scratch. So Rob went up to the fence to demonstrate. The smaller Mandril did indeed come over to the fence, but definitely did not put his belly up for a scratch. Instead he stuck his butt against the fence towards Rob. Haha. Rob stepped away and went to try again, but the Mandril did the exact same thing. The monkeys are definitely some cheeky little buggers.
Anyway, I think that’s most of the highlights from my first day working at a zoo. I’m tired from eight and a half ish hours of walking around and my feet hurt quite a bit, but it was a good day. :)
Oh one last thing I forgot about. Curse my tiny memory. The Aussies really enjoy making fun of my “American accent.” It’s really hilarious to them how I pronounce banana and emu. The proper Aussie way to say emu is like e-mew (Like the pokemon name. Like pew, but with an m.) instead of like e-moo, which I think is how most Americans pronounce it? Maybe I’m just mad. Boy Aaron very much enjoyed pronouncing banana like an American. Boy Aaron could maybe be cute if he didn’t wear girly sunglasses. He seems fun though. He said that he really likes the southern accent. I thought that was really funny because most people make fun of the southern accent and think it sounds kind of stupid. Also, girl Aaron told me that Australia was voted dumbest country, so maybe that’s why they like the “slow” sounding southern accent. Haha. I actually like a good southern accent, so I’m in no means poking fun at it. Anyway, I apparently say tomato incorrectly as well. I guess I have to start working on my Australian accent since I’ll no doubt be made fun of until I sound like one of them.
I was nervous about it for a bit. I didn’t know what I would be expected to do. We start at 8 am and go until 430 ish. I got my lovely knakis on and my new Tassie Zoo shirt and my surprisingly comfy work/hiking boots. I’m really glad I got the boots. We do a ton of walking. Also, the khakis are really comfy. I’m mostly just really comfy. Ah except for the fact that it’s raining quite a bit, so I’m pretty soaked through. I pretty much look like a wet dog. Probably worse. Anyway, so we get into the zoo through the back, which is pretty cool and makes me feel special. Ha. So Justine and I walked up through the zoo to the front to find Rob, but he wasn’t in the gift shop area. A guy in there sent us to the staff room where they do all the food stuff and what not. So we headed over there and ran into three of the people who work at the zoo as well. Aaron boy, Aaron/Erin girl (I have no idea who to spell either of their names, and Cody (I think). They seem nice enough. I’ve spent some time with both Aarons doing some stuff around the zoo. Rob showed up like a minute later ready to work. There was a bunch of fruit and greens. I got to cut some up for the monkeys. Rob took us to each monkey cage and showed up how he feeds them and stuff. He let us into like three of the monkey cages, as well! It was so cool! I don’t really remember the order of everything, but I did heaps (they say “heaps” instead of “a lot”) of really awesome stuff.
So we did the monkey stuff. We gave a lot of the animals fresh water. Most of the birds already had fresh water, so we did the wombat, the rabbits, the sheep, the goats, the cows, the pony, the alpacas, wallabies, etc. I got to hop into a lot of the animals enclosures. Like a big bird one, and there was a cute bird named Sweet Pea that likes getting a scratch so she let me pet her. Wombats apparently really love sweet potatoes, so girl Aaron let me take one into the wombats area and feed her. She came up to me and put her big paws on my leg and let me pet her. Talk about amazing. Rob had to chop up some road kill wallabies and roos to feed the like 20 Devils they have there and the Australian Dogs, so we watched him as he put dead wallabies and roos on a stump and use a big cleaver to chop them into pieces. We took those pieces and fed them to the Devils. The ones we fed are some of the breeding ones so they aren’t on display in the actual zoo.
Side note: I really need to stop saying “cool” so much. I say it heaps. Justine just came in cause Rob stopped by to talk about some internet stuff and since I’m in my room listening to music and writing this, I didn’t know. So she was telling me what he was saying, and I kept responding with “Oh okay that’s cool” and “Cool!” and “That would be cool.” I need a new vocabulary.
Okay so yeah I fed some of the breeding Tassie Devils. It was so fun. They can smell the meat, so they come out of their little hiding places and run up to the gate and some of them try climbing up the gate or running into it because they want the meat so badly. Some of them will growl and stuff. Some are really timid, too. They wouldn’t come out of their hiding spots, so we would throw the meat really close to their little caves and they still wouldn’t come out until we left or something. Most of their enclosures have about three of them in there, so we would put multiple wallaby legs or whatever in there. It’s really funny because all three will go for the same piece of meat instead of going after all the pieces. It’s like the find it necessary to fight. Also, Tassie Devils are really freaking crazy, they eat every part of whatever wallaby part you give them. It’s a little weird to hear them crunching away on the bones like it’s candy.. I found out that their jaw strength is the second strongest of any land mammal, Hyena being first, and it’s just below the strength of a freaking croc’s jaw strength. These guys are really small, like the size of a large cat or something and they could rip your arm off. How insane is that!? It’s really sad though, they only live for about six years.. They are absolutely fascinating creatures. I love them.
So we also tagged along with girl and boy Aaron to watch them feed different stuff. Girl Aaron fed the quolls. They eat this awful mixture of food. I had to mix grated carrots, sweet potatoes, and apple (Who the heck has even grated an apple before? Well, I have now. My skills are expanding rapidly here. Apple grating, meat throwing, wombat feeding, what’s next!?) along with eggs (Not cooked eggs, mind you, just eggs. Snatched out of a carton and thrown into a bucket with the grated stuff.) and some meat and like bird seed looking stuff. How totally random is that, eh? I mixed it all up. With my hands. It was nasty. I went with girl Aaron to move some birds to different cages. We moved this pink Cockatoo named Dolly who is actually a boy Cockatoo. Ha. A ferocious little bugger took his place. He was another Cockatoo, but he’s white and he’s a meanie. He does talk though. It’s funny walking around the park and you hear all these random birds saying stuff like “Hello boy!” and “Polly want a cracker!” and “Puss puss puss.” There’s a cat that walks around the zoo, hence the puss thing, I guess. Maybe it’s just a weird freaking bird. I also got to feed a penguin! The little Fairy penguins, which they call little blue penguins now or something. Only one of them would eat from me because I’m new.. Some day they will love me and all eat from my hands! The big macaw, Marigold, doesn’t like me. I guess she doesn’t like anyone really at first. I went into her cage with her food. She can say cashew because she gets them to eat and likes them. So I went in her cage and girl Aaron told me to stick out my arm and told Marigold to hop on, but Marigold mostly want to snap at me. So I set her food down on the other side of the cage and she flew at my head. Ha. It was a bit unnerving, but she will be fine with me soon hopefully. Justine and I had to clean out the Koala’s cage. The Koala is SO BIG! Apparently his name is Hitler, but they call him Billy for obvious reasons. Man oh man that Koala poops a lot, I mean heaps. Ha. I think that’s most of the cool stuff I did for the day. It was way awesome. I can’t believe I’ve been allowed to do all of this. I never thought I would be climbing into animals enclosures at a zoo, and it would be legal. Nor did I think that I would be feeding any of them. I think it might get a bit monotonous feeding the animals every day for ten weeks, but I can’t believe the amazing experience that I’ll get from all of this!
I forgot to mention that we missed some stuff when we were exploring the zoo the other day. There is in fact a reptile house, as well as some fishes. They have a lung fish. Lung fish are weirdos. They are building this new area for their freshwater croc and gator because they are getting a saltwater croc, and they are going to put all those fish in that area as well. Anyway, they don’t have a ton of reptiles. The zoo is pretty small so that’s not surprising, in fact it’s mostly just a little wildlife park, I guess. I think it’s main point is for the Tassie Devil breeding program. So yeah. Anyway, they have a few Tiger snakes and like one other small ish snake. There are a few lizards that I believe are some sort of skinks. Now the real treat is the two massive snakes that they have. One extremely large python and a boa constrictor, which Rob took out and let me touch! I think the python was much too big and powerful for anyone to take out without seriously fearing for their lives. He had a shed skin in his cage and it was so big, I couldn’t even believe it.
I just remembered a funny story from today. So we were at the Mandrils cage, those are monkeys. Rob was talking about how if you go up to the cage, the smaller Mandril will come over and stick his belly against the fence for a scratch. So Rob went up to the fence to demonstrate. The smaller Mandril did indeed come over to the fence, but definitely did not put his belly up for a scratch. Instead he stuck his butt against the fence towards Rob. Haha. Rob stepped away and went to try again, but the Mandril did the exact same thing. The monkeys are definitely some cheeky little buggers.
Anyway, I think that’s most of the highlights from my first day working at a zoo. I’m tired from eight and a half ish hours of walking around and my feet hurt quite a bit, but it was a good day. :)
Oh one last thing I forgot about. Curse my tiny memory. The Aussies really enjoy making fun of my “American accent.” It’s really hilarious to them how I pronounce banana and emu. The proper Aussie way to say emu is like e-mew (Like the pokemon name. Like pew, but with an m.) instead of like e-moo, which I think is how most Americans pronounce it? Maybe I’m just mad. Boy Aaron very much enjoyed pronouncing banana like an American. Boy Aaron could maybe be cute if he didn’t wear girly sunglasses. He seems fun though. He said that he really likes the southern accent. I thought that was really funny because most people make fun of the southern accent and think it sounds kind of stupid. Also, girl Aaron told me that Australia was voted dumbest country, so maybe that’s why they like the “slow” sounding southern accent. Haha. I actually like a good southern accent, so I’m in no means poking fun at it. Anyway, I apparently say tomato incorrectly as well. I guess I have to start working on my Australian accent since I’ll no doubt be made fun of until I sound like one of them.
Enter Tazzie Devils.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
My down arrow key just popped off.
So yeah it’s really hard living in the middle of nowhere with no reliable transportation.. I wanted to go to church, but the building was pretty far from where we are. I asked Mel about buses and stuff. The zoo has a bus that takes people to town, but it wasn’t running. Mel drove me, but she needed me to leave after just one hour because she had other stuff and it was like a half hour drive to the church building.. At least I got to go to Sacrament Meeting though. My roommate seems to think it’s a bit ridiculous that I’m Mormon or religious or something. She was telling Mel about how she’s definitely a completely different religion and that my religion is way more churchy than “normal” religions. She said she believed more in family and so she would never go to church without her family with her. She made it sound like I clearly do not care about my family since I go to church without them. How dare I! I had a few choice words for her, but I restrained. Hah. We also talked to Rob today and he had mentioned that he would like one of us to work on Sunday through Wednesday because he is the only one working Sundays. He told us that whoever did would get a lot more learning experience faster because they would be the only other person there with him. Justine jumped at the opportunity to say, “Well she’s religious and stuff and so she HAS to go to church on Sundays, but I can do it.” Obviously I would have told him that I don’t work on Sundays, but she just feels this need to cut me down or something. Also, we were talking to another person who works in the gift shop ish place and she asked us where we are from and Justine is from Wisconsin and the lady kind of laughed and I told her I was from LA area in California and she was like, “Oh man, watch out! This girl knows how to party!” Justine was like, “Psh yeah right! She doesn’t even drink so you won’t have to worry about her doing anything.” Thank you Justine. I’m really glad you’re not rude or anything. That would suck. One last Justine comment, and then I’ll go into the actual good stuff. She listens to country music. Aggghhhhhhh. She turned it on loudly on her computer yesterday forcing me to listen to it until I just couldn’t, so I got my ipod out and tuned it all out.
Right so I went to my first Sacrament meeting in Tazzie. That was interesting. It was the smallest ward I’ve ever seen. I don’t know how I’m going to be able to keep getting there though because I can’t very well expect Mel to drive me every Sunday, and if she does I won’t be able to stay for the whole three hours.. I need to figure something out.. Anyway, it was really funny because basically no one can sing there. Hahah. Seriously everyone kept singing at like different speeds and so it kind of sounded just weird and poorly organized, but in an endearing way, if that makes sense. I felt like I fit in because I can’t sing. They also sing every verse for all the songs, like the verses that are always at the bottom of the page instead of with the music and stuff. I loved being there because it was really comforting. It is exactly like going to church in the States except they sound cooler because they have rad accents. Side note: trying to understand a three year old boy with an Australian accent is extremely difficult. I sat next to Cody in the car and he had this motorbike toy and he kept talking about the exhaust pipes and I had no idea what he was talking about for the longest time. Other than that, Cody and I get along better than I get along with anyone else. Hah. He stole my nose many times during the car ride and threw it out the window. It was pretty thrilling. Anyway, the talks were very good and spiritually uplifting. I wish that I had been able to stay for the rest of church.
I finally got to check out the zoo that I’ll be working at! It’s way different than any zoo I’ve ever been to before. It’s pretty old and all the walkways are dirt and stuff, but it’s quaint and they have some cool stuff. I saw some really amazing animals for the first time ever today! I took some pictures, but not as many as I should have, but I’ll be here for a while so it’s not like I won’t have a plethora of opportunities to snag more photos. There’s a LOT of birds there. Some pretty cool ones. They have these Tazzie eagles that are just hanging out on this little islandy place in the lake next to the zoo and they don’t leave. They aren’t closed in or anything. It was amazing. They are absolutely beautiful. They are these gorgeous big black raptors. Fascinating. They have “Australian Dogs”, but Mel told me they are actually Dingoes, but apparently they aren’t supposed to have Dingoes so they are “Australian Dogs.” They sign says that they are way different from Dingoes though, so maybe Mel just THINKS that they are Dingoes. Who knows. They’ve got two little crocs or gators. I don’t remember. Lots of cute monkeys. They have marmosets! They are the cutest monkeys ever! They’re super small and silly looking. I love them. There are Eastern and Spotted Quolls. Quolls are freaking adorable. One of them was super active and it kept coming up to the little window and sitting on it’s hind legs like it was begging me to pick him up and snuggle him. They have one snake. It’s a Tiger snake I think. It’s all black though, so I’m not sure why it’s called a Tiger snake. I saw lots of emus. They make the weirdest noises. I can’t even describe it, but it’s weird. They were following us and it was a bit unnerving. There were some little baby emus too. They could stick their heads out of the little fences. There are little blue penguins there! So funny. We watched Rob feed them. There are like six of them. One is in the middle of molting, so he’s super fat and fluffy. So adorable. I got a picture of him. Lots of kangaroos and wallabies. Some deer. A wombat! Alpacas. A pony. Some sheep and goats and little cows. A huge koala. The roos, deer, and emus were all in the same HUGE enclosure, and Rob went to go feed them and they knew he was coming to feed them so all of a sudden there was this huge crowd of kangaroos, deer, and emus running towards Rob. It was a crazy feeding frenzy! It was so funny. Oh also, there were tons of roosters running around the zoo. They are like the peacocks of every other zoo I’ve ever been to, except there are way more of them. Also, there was a peacock which ruins my peacock analogy.. It was still funny, okay. There was an enclosure that was supposed to be a wombat, but all I saw in it was a bunch of bunnies. I saw my first Echidna EVER! It was so cool! They are such silly animals. He was wandering around in the kangaroo, emu, deer enclosure. Also on my “I’ve never seen this animal in real life and it’s mind boggling to actually get the chance to!” list are... the Tazzie Devils! There are a bunch at this zoo. OH. MY. GOODNESS. They are everything I imagined and more! We got to watch Rob feed them. He feeds them kangaroo arms and legs and stuff. They hiss and growl and stuff. It’s so fun. I got some good pictures. They are really vicious. Rob also had a baby Tazzie Devil with him! I GOT TO PET HER! IT WAS THE GREATEST MOMENT EVER!!!! She was absolutely precious. Highlight of my life. It will probably be up there with stuff like getting married and having kids. Ha.
Well I start work tomorrow! I hope I do okay.. It seems pretty chill. I’m still a little bit nervous that I will pale in comparison to Justine. She is two years older and knows a lot more than I do and has more experience and stuff. We will seeeeeeee.
Also, I found out today that Rob shuts the internets off from 11 am to 11 pm.. What the heck? So I can only get on the internet in one spot of the house late at night or early in the morning. Sighhh. Oh well. I’ll adjust. Probably. :)
So yeah it’s really hard living in the middle of nowhere with no reliable transportation.. I wanted to go to church, but the building was pretty far from where we are. I asked Mel about buses and stuff. The zoo has a bus that takes people to town, but it wasn’t running. Mel drove me, but she needed me to leave after just one hour because she had other stuff and it was like a half hour drive to the church building.. At least I got to go to Sacrament Meeting though. My roommate seems to think it’s a bit ridiculous that I’m Mormon or religious or something. She was telling Mel about how she’s definitely a completely different religion and that my religion is way more churchy than “normal” religions. She said she believed more in family and so she would never go to church without her family with her. She made it sound like I clearly do not care about my family since I go to church without them. How dare I! I had a few choice words for her, but I restrained. Hah. We also talked to Rob today and he had mentioned that he would like one of us to work on Sunday through Wednesday because he is the only one working Sundays. He told us that whoever did would get a lot more learning experience faster because they would be the only other person there with him. Justine jumped at the opportunity to say, “Well she’s religious and stuff and so she HAS to go to church on Sundays, but I can do it.” Obviously I would have told him that I don’t work on Sundays, but she just feels this need to cut me down or something. Also, we were talking to another person who works in the gift shop ish place and she asked us where we are from and Justine is from Wisconsin and the lady kind of laughed and I told her I was from LA area in California and she was like, “Oh man, watch out! This girl knows how to party!” Justine was like, “Psh yeah right! She doesn’t even drink so you won’t have to worry about her doing anything.” Thank you Justine. I’m really glad you’re not rude or anything. That would suck. One last Justine comment, and then I’ll go into the actual good stuff. She listens to country music. Aggghhhhhhh. She turned it on loudly on her computer yesterday forcing me to listen to it until I just couldn’t, so I got my ipod out and tuned it all out.
Right so I went to my first Sacrament meeting in Tazzie. That was interesting. It was the smallest ward I’ve ever seen. I don’t know how I’m going to be able to keep getting there though because I can’t very well expect Mel to drive me every Sunday, and if she does I won’t be able to stay for the whole three hours.. I need to figure something out.. Anyway, it was really funny because basically no one can sing there. Hahah. Seriously everyone kept singing at like different speeds and so it kind of sounded just weird and poorly organized, but in an endearing way, if that makes sense. I felt like I fit in because I can’t sing. They also sing every verse for all the songs, like the verses that are always at the bottom of the page instead of with the music and stuff. I loved being there because it was really comforting. It is exactly like going to church in the States except they sound cooler because they have rad accents. Side note: trying to understand a three year old boy with an Australian accent is extremely difficult. I sat next to Cody in the car and he had this motorbike toy and he kept talking about the exhaust pipes and I had no idea what he was talking about for the longest time. Other than that, Cody and I get along better than I get along with anyone else. Hah. He stole my nose many times during the car ride and threw it out the window. It was pretty thrilling. Anyway, the talks were very good and spiritually uplifting. I wish that I had been able to stay for the rest of church.
I finally got to check out the zoo that I’ll be working at! It’s way different than any zoo I’ve ever been to before. It’s pretty old and all the walkways are dirt and stuff, but it’s quaint and they have some cool stuff. I saw some really amazing animals for the first time ever today! I took some pictures, but not as many as I should have, but I’ll be here for a while so it’s not like I won’t have a plethora of opportunities to snag more photos. There’s a LOT of birds there. Some pretty cool ones. They have these Tazzie eagles that are just hanging out on this little islandy place in the lake next to the zoo and they don’t leave. They aren’t closed in or anything. It was amazing. They are absolutely beautiful. They are these gorgeous big black raptors. Fascinating. They have “Australian Dogs”, but Mel told me they are actually Dingoes, but apparently they aren’t supposed to have Dingoes so they are “Australian Dogs.” They sign says that they are way different from Dingoes though, so maybe Mel just THINKS that they are Dingoes. Who knows. They’ve got two little crocs or gators. I don’t remember. Lots of cute monkeys. They have marmosets! They are the cutest monkeys ever! They’re super small and silly looking. I love them. There are Eastern and Spotted Quolls. Quolls are freaking adorable. One of them was super active and it kept coming up to the little window and sitting on it’s hind legs like it was begging me to pick him up and snuggle him. They have one snake. It’s a Tiger snake I think. It’s all black though, so I’m not sure why it’s called a Tiger snake. I saw lots of emus. They make the weirdest noises. I can’t even describe it, but it’s weird. They were following us and it was a bit unnerving. There were some little baby emus too. They could stick their heads out of the little fences. There are little blue penguins there! So funny. We watched Rob feed them. There are like six of them. One is in the middle of molting, so he’s super fat and fluffy. So adorable. I got a picture of him. Lots of kangaroos and wallabies. Some deer. A wombat! Alpacas. A pony. Some sheep and goats and little cows. A huge koala. The roos, deer, and emus were all in the same HUGE enclosure, and Rob went to go feed them and they knew he was coming to feed them so all of a sudden there was this huge crowd of kangaroos, deer, and emus running towards Rob. It was a crazy feeding frenzy! It was so funny. Oh also, there were tons of roosters running around the zoo. They are like the peacocks of every other zoo I’ve ever been to, except there are way more of them. Also, there was a peacock which ruins my peacock analogy.. It was still funny, okay. There was an enclosure that was supposed to be a wombat, but all I saw in it was a bunch of bunnies. I saw my first Echidna EVER! It was so cool! They are such silly animals. He was wandering around in the kangaroo, emu, deer enclosure. Also on my “I’ve never seen this animal in real life and it’s mind boggling to actually get the chance to!” list are... the Tazzie Devils! There are a bunch at this zoo. OH. MY. GOODNESS. They are everything I imagined and more! We got to watch Rob feed them. He feeds them kangaroo arms and legs and stuff. They hiss and growl and stuff. It’s so fun. I got some good pictures. They are really vicious. Rob also had a baby Tazzie Devil with him! I GOT TO PET HER! IT WAS THE GREATEST MOMENT EVER!!!! She was absolutely precious. Highlight of my life. It will probably be up there with stuff like getting married and having kids. Ha.
Well I start work tomorrow! I hope I do okay.. It seems pretty chill. I’m still a little bit nervous that I will pale in comparison to Justine. She is two years older and knows a lot more than I do and has more experience and stuff. We will seeeeeeee.
Also, I found out today that Rob shuts the internets off from 11 am to 11 pm.. What the heck? So I can only get on the internet in one spot of the house late at night or early in the morning. Sighhh. Oh well. I’ll adjust. Probably. :)
When Frogs Attack.
So I’ve finally made it to Launceston, Tasmania! The plane rides were pretty uneventful. I flew from Cairns to Melbourne first. It was like a three and a half hour flight. I had around three hours between landing and my next flight, so I went to re check my bags, but of course they had a specific time that I was allowed to check my bags back in and of course it wasn’t until an hour later. So I lugged my massive bags around for an hour. After checking them back in, I sat at the gate and did nothing for two hours until we finally got on the plane. The flight seriously felt like five minutes. In all actuality it was probably fifty ish minutes, but by the time I was allowed to use my ipod, I got a chance to listen to like five songs before a flight attendant told me to put turn my ipod off because we were beginning our descent. Crazy right? Anyway, the airport was super tiny. Just like Burbank. I got off the plane and into the airport and a cute skinny blonde lady with a small child was standing there with a sign that had my name on it. Her name is Mel and the small child is Cody, he is three and he is an absolute riot. Mel is my supervisor’s girlfriend. She just barely moved to Tazzie to live with him. She’s super nice and we chatted the whole drive. She even stopped at a grocery store so I could get some food and a blow dryer and straightener and stuff. Side note: I just attempted to straighten my hair for the first time in Australia and it was an epic fail.. my hair is still a frizzy mess. Looks like I’ll be wearing it up pretty much every single day. Anyway, going into an Australian grocery store was a little weird. It’s basically the same as any American grocery store.. except all of the brands are completely different, and I’m not sure they have different percent milks. Of course I don’t really know because I mostly just kind of grabbed things and hoped they were edible or drinkable or something useful to me. Ha. Mel had originally sent me into the store by myself and she was going to hang out in the car with little Cody, but after like five minutes she came running into the store and found me and was like “I just realized that you’re not from here and maybe it’s different! So I came to help!” So Cody hopped onto the cart because he’s wild like that, and they walked around with me helping me find things. Cody threw a fit because he wanted those chewy vitamin things, and then he threw a fit in the car when he could eat the whole entire bottle of chewy vitamin things. He grabbed bags of groceries and was waving them around. It was hilarious. Mel told me that Cody has already been on 24 plane rides. The kid is only three years old and he’s been to like Thailand and Singapore and all over Australia. He also lives at a zoo. I mean what three year old wouldn’t kill to live at a zoo and be able to pet all these cool animals all the time. Lucky little bugger. Anyway, after the grocery store we headed to my new home for the next little while.
After a rough drive on some little dirt roads, we pulled up to this place...
Obviously, I was a little apprehensive.. Haha. However, when we got inside it looks even better than like my apartment in Provo. Ha. Here’s some pictures..
The bedroom is pretty spacious. You’ll notice that there is a small bed, and a big bed. Guess which one I snagged? Yeaaaaah. I’m selfish. However, when she arrived she said, “I would’ve done the same.” So I feel less bad about taking the better bed.
Walk-in closet? Yes please! It’s awesome. I want my own real walk-in closet. Of course, I would rather not share one so all my clothes don’t have to be folded up like that. Oh wells. There’s a full length mirror on the wall you can’t see. So it’s pretty sweet. There’s a curtain as well so you can close it when you’re changing and stuff.
Okay it was really hard to get a picture to do this justice, so I'm just going to tell you about it. Our shower has no tub or separation from the rest of the floor at all. Like there’s just a curtain. The shower at the hotel in Cairns is like that too. So our floor is like permanently wet in the bathroom since the water just goes everywhere when you shower.
This is the living room and the kitchen past that. It’s bigger than my living room in Provo with a nicer TV. Haha. The couches are pretty comfy, too. Mel put some movies in our place for us. It’s a really random collection of movies. There are quite a few horror movies, like Saw. Yeah right, like I’m going to watch that movie while I’m in this little house in the middle of nowhere and there’s lots of weird noises at night and I’m with some girl I don’t even know. Sounds like fun, yeah? Ha. No there’s a few movies I haven’t seen that I plan on watching, so that should be good since I probably actually won’t be able to get down to town very often.. Speaking of movies, Mel told me that movies in America play here too, but not until waaay later. She went to America for a month long trip and saw a movie there, and when she came back the same movie came out like 7 months later. So weird. So I’m interested to see what stuff is playing around here right now. Anyway, the kitchen isn’t huge, but it’s not like I need much space. It’s nice enough. Whatevs.
This is some nice little squishy chair near a window that looks like a really fantastic reading place. It reminds me of the chairs in my living room at home in California. I’ll most definitely be spending a lot of time in it.
So yeah, I’m just getting used to living in a new place with a new person, who I don’t know if I particularly get along with very well. We’re civil enough with each other that I don’t think this will be a problem. I’m excited to see the zoo. Mel says it’s not a super nice zoo in that it doesn’t have lots of nice new buildings and stuff like that, but she says it’s really great. I’m stoked.
Ah the frog thing. Right. So last night I came into my room and Justine, my roommate, was on the floor reaching under her bed saying stuff like “Get back here!” I asked her what the heck she was doing and she said, “Oh there’s a frog in here.” She finally got him and showed him to me. Here he is!
We also had a lizard visit us. He was not caught. Who knows where he is now.
This morning I went outside and walked down a little path to look around a little bit, so here’s the gorgeous stuff that I get to live by :)
After a rough drive on some little dirt roads, we pulled up to this place...
Obviously, I was a little apprehensive.. Haha. However, when we got inside it looks even better than like my apartment in Provo. Ha. Here’s some pictures..
The bedroom is pretty spacious. You’ll notice that there is a small bed, and a big bed. Guess which one I snagged? Yeaaaaah. I’m selfish. However, when she arrived she said, “I would’ve done the same.” So I feel less bad about taking the better bed.
Walk-in closet? Yes please! It’s awesome. I want my own real walk-in closet. Of course, I would rather not share one so all my clothes don’t have to be folded up like that. Oh wells. There’s a full length mirror on the wall you can’t see. So it’s pretty sweet. There’s a curtain as well so you can close it when you’re changing and stuff.
Okay it was really hard to get a picture to do this justice, so I'm just going to tell you about it. Our shower has no tub or separation from the rest of the floor at all. Like there’s just a curtain. The shower at the hotel in Cairns is like that too. So our floor is like permanently wet in the bathroom since the water just goes everywhere when you shower.
This is the living room and the kitchen past that. It’s bigger than my living room in Provo with a nicer TV. Haha. The couches are pretty comfy, too. Mel put some movies in our place for us. It’s a really random collection of movies. There are quite a few horror movies, like Saw. Yeah right, like I’m going to watch that movie while I’m in this little house in the middle of nowhere and there’s lots of weird noises at night and I’m with some girl I don’t even know. Sounds like fun, yeah? Ha. No there’s a few movies I haven’t seen that I plan on watching, so that should be good since I probably actually won’t be able to get down to town very often.. Speaking of movies, Mel told me that movies in America play here too, but not until waaay later. She went to America for a month long trip and saw a movie there, and when she came back the same movie came out like 7 months later. So weird. So I’m interested to see what stuff is playing around here right now. Anyway, the kitchen isn’t huge, but it’s not like I need much space. It’s nice enough. Whatevs.
This is some nice little squishy chair near a window that looks like a really fantastic reading place. It reminds me of the chairs in my living room at home in California. I’ll most definitely be spending a lot of time in it.
So yeah, I’m just getting used to living in a new place with a new person, who I don’t know if I particularly get along with very well. We’re civil enough with each other that I don’t think this will be a problem. I’m excited to see the zoo. Mel says it’s not a super nice zoo in that it doesn’t have lots of nice new buildings and stuff like that, but she says it’s really great. I’m stoked.
Ah the frog thing. Right. So last night I came into my room and Justine, my roommate, was on the floor reaching under her bed saying stuff like “Get back here!” I asked her what the heck she was doing and she said, “Oh there’s a frog in here.” She finally got him and showed him to me. Here he is!
We also had a lizard visit us. He was not caught. Who knows where he is now.
This morning I went outside and walked down a little path to look around a little bit, so here’s the gorgeous stuff that I get to live by :)
FOOOOOD.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
My favorite chocolate bar has changed! Australia is clearly making me into a whole new woman. I’m not really sure what my favorite chocolate was pre-Australia.. maybe Snickers or something. I don’t really know, but my eyes have been opened, and my new favorite chocolate EVER is.. wait for iiiiiiiiit ..... The Kinder Bueno! Seriously. It’s the tastiest chocolate thing ever. It has like hazelnut cream in it and like crunchy wafer stuff too. It’s fan freaking tastic. Australia has lots of weird new chocolate bars that I’ve never heard of before. It’s so fun. I’ve tried three. One is the Kinder Bueno one. Another was calllllled.. shoot I don’t remember, but it’s exactly like another one called Aero I think. It’s got all these little air bubbles in between the chocolate. It’s weird and I’m not really a fan of it. The last one I tried was called a Crunchie. I thought it would be like a crunch bar or something. No. Not at all. It had like honeycomb in it or something. It was okay. Really sweet. Not really my thing. I can’t believe I just typed this whole paragraph up about chocolate. Sighhhh. Oh also, I hear that the gummy candy, you know like gummy worms and stuff, is way better than the gummy candy in the States. I’ll be trying that next.
Speaking of food, I didn’t think that food would be much different here than in the States, but it’s actually pretty different. The first day we had a “sausage sizzle”, sausage basically means hot dog in this case. However, there were three types of hot dog to choose from, which is where this is a bit different. There were beef hot dogs, lamb hot dogs, and chicken hot dogs. Bizarre eh? We also had a really interesting dinner tonight. It was apparently BBQ, but there were not burgers in sight. There were chicken hot dogs and strange little steaks that didn’t really taste like steaks. I’m not sure what they were actually, but they were tasty. There was a bunch of like vegetable mixtures too. Like there was a cold dish that was corn and peas and broccoli and onions and weird things that I couldn’t tell you what they were, and then there was a hot dish that was like sweet potatoes and zucchini and something else that I couldn’t identify, there was also scalloped potatoes with some weird saucey stuff with stringy onions. It was all okay. At Rainforestation they had really tasty soup that was called chicken and corn soup. It was so good! They also seem to be really big on fruit. I’ve had pineapple with just about every meal so far. Today for lunch on the boat they had little pineapple chunks covered in coconut shavings. It was pretty yummy. The pineapple here is way yummier than in the States. Sorry America. Yeah so I’ve been eating a lot of fruit here. They seem to like passion fruit. It looks weird and I haven’t tried it yet. It has like tentacles growing inside of it. Blechh. There is always watermelon, pineapple, oranges, and grapes though. Delightful!
I think I mentioned that I had Indian food for dinner one night. It was at this little Indian restaurant called Mother India that was like a thirty minute walk from our hotel. It is really surprising to hear an Indian guy speak with an Australian accent. It was really cool. He was really nice. A boy that was with us kept asking questions like “Do you have free refills” and the man was like “Pretty sure that’s an American thing, like those HUGE drinks. We don’t do that.” He kept asking questions and the guy kept saying, “Nope. That’s just an American thing.” Going to different countries and seeing how small everything is, like food portions, drinks, cars, building, etc, makes you realize how pathetic Americans are in some ways. We are obviously very firm in our belief of bigger is better, or something. Ha. Anyway, the food there was good, but oh my goodness it was spicy as heck! I got medium because the way the guy explained it, medium sounded like a smart choice. Ohhh boy was I wrong! It was the spiciest thing I’ve ever eaten! I’m such a wuss. I need to start toughening up my taste buds. I’m hoping to maybe expand my food likes here. It will be good. Also, delicious.
And yes, I did just write an entire post about FOOD.
Speaking of food, I didn’t think that food would be much different here than in the States, but it’s actually pretty different. The first day we had a “sausage sizzle”, sausage basically means hot dog in this case. However, there were three types of hot dog to choose from, which is where this is a bit different. There were beef hot dogs, lamb hot dogs, and chicken hot dogs. Bizarre eh? We also had a really interesting dinner tonight. It was apparently BBQ, but there were not burgers in sight. There were chicken hot dogs and strange little steaks that didn’t really taste like steaks. I’m not sure what they were actually, but they were tasty. There was a bunch of like vegetable mixtures too. Like there was a cold dish that was corn and peas and broccoli and onions and weird things that I couldn’t tell you what they were, and then there was a hot dish that was like sweet potatoes and zucchini and something else that I couldn’t identify, there was also scalloped potatoes with some weird saucey stuff with stringy onions. It was all okay. At Rainforestation they had really tasty soup that was called chicken and corn soup. It was so good! They also seem to be really big on fruit. I’ve had pineapple with just about every meal so far. Today for lunch on the boat they had little pineapple chunks covered in coconut shavings. It was pretty yummy. The pineapple here is way yummier than in the States. Sorry America. Yeah so I’ve been eating a lot of fruit here. They seem to like passion fruit. It looks weird and I haven’t tried it yet. It has like tentacles growing inside of it. Blechh. There is always watermelon, pineapple, oranges, and grapes though. Delightful!
I think I mentioned that I had Indian food for dinner one night. It was at this little Indian restaurant called Mother India that was like a thirty minute walk from our hotel. It is really surprising to hear an Indian guy speak with an Australian accent. It was really cool. He was really nice. A boy that was with us kept asking questions like “Do you have free refills” and the man was like “Pretty sure that’s an American thing, like those HUGE drinks. We don’t do that.” He kept asking questions and the guy kept saying, “Nope. That’s just an American thing.” Going to different countries and seeing how small everything is, like food portions, drinks, cars, building, etc, makes you realize how pathetic Americans are in some ways. We are obviously very firm in our belief of bigger is better, or something. Ha. Anyway, the food there was good, but oh my goodness it was spicy as heck! I got medium because the way the guy explained it, medium sounded like a smart choice. Ohhh boy was I wrong! It was the spiciest thing I’ve ever eaten! I’m such a wuss. I need to start toughening up my taste buds. I’m hoping to maybe expand my food likes here. It will be good. Also, delicious.
And yes, I did just write an entire post about FOOD.
Shark Bait. Ho Ha Ha.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Fun fact: Finding Nemo is apparently really popular in Australia, according to Todd.
Okay, but seriouslyyy, I saw a shark today. Hence the shark title. A black tip reef shark. It was extremely adorable/a little bit terrifying. Today was “Take the American interns to the Great Barrier Reef for snorkeling adventures and nasty sunburns!” day. Every single hour, I put on practically every drop of sunscreen I had with me. What did I get in return for being overly cautious with the sunscreen? Bright red skin! Huzzah! They aren’t kidding when they say the sun here is a million times harsher than in the states. I would not have been burnt anywhere on my skin at home. Worth it though. The Great Barrier Reef is absolutely beautiful. We woke up bright and early to hop on a bus to get to a boat to get to the reef. The boat ride to the reef was two HOURS. It was fun though. The boat had those things in the front that look like trampolines, but are really hammocky type things. Of course, when you lie on those you also get extremely wet if the water is really choppy.. which it was. I was already 100% soaked about 20 minutes into the boat ride. Luckily it was pretty warm so it’s not like I was freezing. We went to two different snorkeling sites over a period of about five hours. We all wore silly stinger suits because it’s jelly season and there’s little guys that are smaller than your finger nail and basically invisible that can get you good if they can get at your skin. So basically there were like a hundred people in these ridiculous shocking blue similar to wetsuit things that had little mitten things on the ends to cover your hands and hoods to cover your neck and head and stuff. Everyone looked pretty dang stupid.
Fun fact: Red heads in Australia are often referred to as Blues. I was talking about the blue suits and I remembered this fun fact and didn’t want to forget it.. so yeah.
Back to the Reef stuff.. So yeah we all hopped off the boat into the nice warm Reef water and got to explore for like two hours in the first area. I saw lots of really neato fishies. There were lots of convict fish, which are black and white striped ones, and huuuge parrot fish, and lots of really brightly colored ones that I don’t know the names of, and butterfly fishes, and bat fishes, and big black ones, and little black ones, and pink ones... so on and so forth. Lots of fish, mmkay? The first site we went to didn’t have tons of really bright coral. It was a lot of dead coral and boring looking coral. So I mostly just looked at the fishes. The second area was waaaay better. It was off this little island that is a bird sanctuary, so there’s just a little roped off area where people can be. There were TONS of birds there. One of the girls got pooped on. Heh. It was a really shallow area, so the reef was way closer to the surface than at the first spot. It was so close that any where you were you had to be really careful or else you could kill some coral. This place had turtles and stuff, but I actually didn’t see any of them.. but I was the only one who saw multiple sting rays! They were so cool! they were like white ish with blue spots on them. It’s so fun watching them move around. I also saw these weird fish that were really long and skinny and flat with really long skinny flat noses. They looked like a strip of paper with eyeballs that could swim. They were super bizarre. The coral was a lot more exciting here too. Really big and bright and colorful. Oh, there were also these massive clams there. Seriously, HUGE. They were really cool. The sharks were at both sites. They were really awesome. Everything was just really awesome. I feel like every post I’ve done is pretty much me just saying, “This was awesome” “That was awesome” “They were awesome”. I clearly need a more expansive vocabulary. Anyway, we left and took the billion hour boat ride back to land. One of the crew members did a really exciting magic rope trick right before we got back. It was that one where they keep cutting it, but it’s still together and they will cut it into different sizes, but then they will be all the same size again. I think I should probably learn some magic tricks. I would probably be much cooler if I knew magic tricks.
On the mosquito bite front, I’ve lost count. However, I do have one on a finger now so that’s something that’s new and exciting.
I’m heading to Tasmania tomorrow finally!!! This whole vacationy thing has been nice and what not, but I’ve heard good things about Launceston and want to see it for myself! I’ve got a nice long day of traveling tomorrow, which sucks, but I can’t wait to stop living out of suitcases and unpack my things in my new home for two and a half months! Eek! I can’t believe I’ve only been gone for like three days.. It feels like it’s been so much longer. I also can’t wait to go to the ward in Launceston. I hope I actually find a way to get there. It will be interesting to meet some LDS Aussies in Lonnie (People keep referring to Launceston as Lonnie, I’ve realized that they shorten lots of things and put the y or ie sound at the end... barbie, pokie (poker machine), Brizzie (Brisbane).. I can’t think of any other ones off the top of my head right now..). It seems like all Australians are mostly just constantly drunk, soo I hope that’s not the case at church.. Hah.
Also, I feel a little bit sick. I think it might be the food I ate today.. I dunno. Or maybe it's the spicy Indian food that I ate last night. That food was sooooooo freaking spicy!
Okay, but seriouslyyy, I saw a shark today. Hence the shark title. A black tip reef shark. It was extremely adorable/a little bit terrifying. Today was “Take the American interns to the Great Barrier Reef for snorkeling adventures and nasty sunburns!” day. Every single hour, I put on practically every drop of sunscreen I had with me. What did I get in return for being overly cautious with the sunscreen? Bright red skin! Huzzah! They aren’t kidding when they say the sun here is a million times harsher than in the states. I would not have been burnt anywhere on my skin at home. Worth it though. The Great Barrier Reef is absolutely beautiful. We woke up bright and early to hop on a bus to get to a boat to get to the reef. The boat ride to the reef was two HOURS. It was fun though. The boat had those things in the front that look like trampolines, but are really hammocky type things. Of course, when you lie on those you also get extremely wet if the water is really choppy.. which it was. I was already 100% soaked about 20 minutes into the boat ride. Luckily it was pretty warm so it’s not like I was freezing. We went to two different snorkeling sites over a period of about five hours. We all wore silly stinger suits because it’s jelly season and there’s little guys that are smaller than your finger nail and basically invisible that can get you good if they can get at your skin. So basically there were like a hundred people in these ridiculous shocking blue similar to wetsuit things that had little mitten things on the ends to cover your hands and hoods to cover your neck and head and stuff. Everyone looked pretty dang stupid.
Fun fact: Red heads in Australia are often referred to as Blues. I was talking about the blue suits and I remembered this fun fact and didn’t want to forget it.. so yeah.
Back to the Reef stuff.. So yeah we all hopped off the boat into the nice warm Reef water and got to explore for like two hours in the first area. I saw lots of really neato fishies. There were lots of convict fish, which are black and white striped ones, and huuuge parrot fish, and lots of really brightly colored ones that I don’t know the names of, and butterfly fishes, and bat fishes, and big black ones, and little black ones, and pink ones... so on and so forth. Lots of fish, mmkay? The first site we went to didn’t have tons of really bright coral. It was a lot of dead coral and boring looking coral. So I mostly just looked at the fishes. The second area was waaaay better. It was off this little island that is a bird sanctuary, so there’s just a little roped off area where people can be. There were TONS of birds there. One of the girls got pooped on. Heh. It was a really shallow area, so the reef was way closer to the surface than at the first spot. It was so close that any where you were you had to be really careful or else you could kill some coral. This place had turtles and stuff, but I actually didn’t see any of them.. but I was the only one who saw multiple sting rays! They were so cool! they were like white ish with blue spots on them. It’s so fun watching them move around. I also saw these weird fish that were really long and skinny and flat with really long skinny flat noses. They looked like a strip of paper with eyeballs that could swim. They were super bizarre. The coral was a lot more exciting here too. Really big and bright and colorful. Oh, there were also these massive clams there. Seriously, HUGE. They were really cool. The sharks were at both sites. They were really awesome. Everything was just really awesome. I feel like every post I’ve done is pretty much me just saying, “This was awesome” “That was awesome” “They were awesome”. I clearly need a more expansive vocabulary. Anyway, we left and took the billion hour boat ride back to land. One of the crew members did a really exciting magic rope trick right before we got back. It was that one where they keep cutting it, but it’s still together and they will cut it into different sizes, but then they will be all the same size again. I think I should probably learn some magic tricks. I would probably be much cooler if I knew magic tricks.
On the mosquito bite front, I’ve lost count. However, I do have one on a finger now so that’s something that’s new and exciting.
I’m heading to Tasmania tomorrow finally!!! This whole vacationy thing has been nice and what not, but I’ve heard good things about Launceston and want to see it for myself! I’ve got a nice long day of traveling tomorrow, which sucks, but I can’t wait to stop living out of suitcases and unpack my things in my new home for two and a half months! Eek! I can’t believe I’ve only been gone for like three days.. It feels like it’s been so much longer. I also can’t wait to go to the ward in Launceston. I hope I actually find a way to get there. It will be interesting to meet some LDS Aussies in Lonnie (People keep referring to Launceston as Lonnie, I’ve realized that they shorten lots of things and put the y or ie sound at the end... barbie, pokie (poker machine), Brizzie (Brisbane).. I can’t think of any other ones off the top of my head right now..). It seems like all Australians are mostly just constantly drunk, soo I hope that’s not the case at church.. Hah.
Also, I feel a little bit sick. I think it might be the food I ate today.. I dunno. Or maybe it's the spicy Indian food that I ate last night. That food was sooooooo freaking spicy!
Rainforestation Dayyyyy.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Mmkay day two in Cairns was the greatest day ever. I actually slept really well and woke up on time and wasn’t too tired or anything. We had breakfast at 745 and then had our second “session”, which basically involves Todd and Jay, our program leader guys, telling us about things like culture shock, drinking responsibly, not taking on driving in Australia because they drive on the left side, how Australians view Americans, Australian slang, etc. Then we all hopped on a little bus and headed into the rainforest to go to Rainforestation. It was so cooooool. It’s like a tiny wildlife park, emphasis on tiny. There are seriously kangaroos and wallabies just walking around in this little patch of grass. We got to walk around and pet them and feed them!! They were super chill. They just sat there and let you pet them and ate out of your hands. It was so amazing! They are really soft and adorable. So after that this cute ish boy with crazy hair and pierced ears took us over to the crocodiles and said that they would normally feed them in front of us, but they had just fed him like an hour before and when they feed them they hold the food out in the air and the croc jumps really high out of the water to get it! I saw a picture of it and it looked really cool. Anyway the crocodile we saw was massive! His name is Jack, as in the Ripper. Ha. Hair & piercings boy told us why that’s his name. Before Jack came to Rainforestation, he was at a breeding place and they put a female in with him like every week or month or something and he killed every single one of them instead of mating with them. Haha. So after visiting with Jack, we went into a koala room and looked at cute koalas. Aww. There was also a little cage next to the koala place with a HUUUGE spider in it. Seriously, it makes me a lot more terrified of spiders knowing that big guys like that are crawling around. I got to hold a big water python after that! It was so pretty. Piercing boy would put it around our necks and one of the girls started freaking out right after he set the snake down on her. She was screeching and wiggling around and was probably going to cry. Piercing boy said it was the second worst freak out he has seen.
I’m taking a break from this story to mention that I currently have ten mosquito bites. My second day in Australia and I already have ten bites. I’m pretty itchy..
So after the snake we left the animal portion of the park. Oh, and there were dingoes there! So cute! Okay, anyway, we went to this little room where they had little canvases set out for each of us and paint! Each canvas had an animal on it already. I got stuck with a weird eel looking thing, but it was way fun getting to paint. They only gave us colors that Aboriginals use I guess. Like red, yellow, and white because they can be made from natural stuff. I love doing crafty things like that, makes me feel like a kid. Then we went to this little theater and some guys did a bunch of Aboriginal dances and played the digiridoo (I have no idea how to spell that..). It was really cool. They were all shirtless and painted and stuff. It was pretty cool. Sometimes the music sounded a little techno ish. Not like computery, but like the beat sounded like it was a techno song. Maybe you would have to have been there.. Ha. At the end they picked three volunteers to come up, a girl from my group of interns and two asian people, but when those three got up there, there was some how like eight tiny asian kids that appeared on stage. Hah. They taught them a dance and made them all do it by themselves. It was SO funny. After they sent everyone off the stage, some little asian boy refused to go and so he stayed up there, center stage, while the dancers did one last dance. He bowed at the end too. It was sooo funny. We left the theater then and went to a different area where one of the painted shirtless guys showed up digiridoos and how they are made and how to play them. He let us all try. I failed miserably. Fortunately for me, so did everyone else except for like one boy. There was a big field near us, so after the digiridoo failures they showed us some spears and what the use to throw them. It was super rad. He showed us how far he could throw it without the weird spear throwing helper, and it was pretty dang far actually. Then he used the spear helper thing and oh my goodness that spear went so dang far! He also impressed everyone by hitting some pretty far off targets. It was crazy. Next we learned how to throw boomerangs! Haha. The painted guy showed us all how to do it and we each got a turn to throw one. I had a really good throw actually. It got like halfway to me! The last girl that went actually had it come all the way back to her feet. The two boys threw them into trees and a bunch of other girls threw them like three feet in front of them on the ground. We had a really tasty all you can eat buffet after that, and I sat next to some girl who was asking me about what school I went to and stuff. When I told her that I go to BYU she was like “Ohhhhh are you like Mormon??” and I obviously said yes, and she responded with “That’s cool. I took a world religion class once and we talked about Mormons. Ohh and like that uhmmmm John guy!” Haha. Anyway, after lunch we went on an Army Duck! There like big tank ish things except they are open on top and they can drive on land and in water! It was crazy. We drove through the rainforest. Super gorgeous. We saw little water dragons and some small snapping turtles, too. The last thing we did was hold koala bears. No big. :D No but seriously, it was the cutest thing ever. He was really soft and adorable and had big claws! Sadly, we had to leave after that. It was really fun! I love getting to do all these things that I would never have been able to if I stayed in school this semester!
I’m taking a break from this story to mention that I currently have ten mosquito bites. My second day in Australia and I already have ten bites. I’m pretty itchy..
So after the snake we left the animal portion of the park. Oh, and there were dingoes there! So cute! Okay, anyway, we went to this little room where they had little canvases set out for each of us and paint! Each canvas had an animal on it already. I got stuck with a weird eel looking thing, but it was way fun getting to paint. They only gave us colors that Aboriginals use I guess. Like red, yellow, and white because they can be made from natural stuff. I love doing crafty things like that, makes me feel like a kid. Then we went to this little theater and some guys did a bunch of Aboriginal dances and played the digiridoo (I have no idea how to spell that..). It was really cool. They were all shirtless and painted and stuff. It was pretty cool. Sometimes the music sounded a little techno ish. Not like computery, but like the beat sounded like it was a techno song. Maybe you would have to have been there.. Ha. At the end they picked three volunteers to come up, a girl from my group of interns and two asian people, but when those three got up there, there was some how like eight tiny asian kids that appeared on stage. Hah. They taught them a dance and made them all do it by themselves. It was SO funny. After they sent everyone off the stage, some little asian boy refused to go and so he stayed up there, center stage, while the dancers did one last dance. He bowed at the end too. It was sooo funny. We left the theater then and went to a different area where one of the painted shirtless guys showed up digiridoos and how they are made and how to play them. He let us all try. I failed miserably. Fortunately for me, so did everyone else except for like one boy. There was a big field near us, so after the digiridoo failures they showed us some spears and what the use to throw them. It was super rad. He showed us how far he could throw it without the weird spear throwing helper, and it was pretty dang far actually. Then he used the spear helper thing and oh my goodness that spear went so dang far! He also impressed everyone by hitting some pretty far off targets. It was crazy. Next we learned how to throw boomerangs! Haha. The painted guy showed us all how to do it and we each got a turn to throw one. I had a really good throw actually. It got like halfway to me! The last girl that went actually had it come all the way back to her feet. The two boys threw them into trees and a bunch of other girls threw them like three feet in front of them on the ground. We had a really tasty all you can eat buffet after that, and I sat next to some girl who was asking me about what school I went to and stuff. When I told her that I go to BYU she was like “Ohhhhh are you like Mormon??” and I obviously said yes, and she responded with “That’s cool. I took a world religion class once and we talked about Mormons. Ohh and like that uhmmmm John guy!” Haha. Anyway, after lunch we went on an Army Duck! There like big tank ish things except they are open on top and they can drive on land and in water! It was crazy. We drove through the rainforest. Super gorgeous. We saw little water dragons and some small snapping turtles, too. The last thing we did was hold koala bears. No big. :D No but seriously, it was the cutest thing ever. He was really soft and adorable and had big claws! Sadly, we had to leave after that. It was really fun! I love getting to do all these things that I would never have been able to if I stayed in school this semester!
Happy Australia Day!!
FYI: This was supposed to be posted yesterday, but I didn't have time. Sooooo all of this is about yesterday. Not today. :)
That’s what today is. It’s a for real holiday. I don’t know what it’s for though. The girl that I’m living with for the next ten weeks does. She didn’t tell me. I know, she’s a peach. Anyway...
I’M IN AUSTRALIA!
...And I already have like three mosquito bites! It’s so exciting! Haha. I’m currently in Cairns for a few days for an orientationy type thing. It is really beautiful here and I really love it. Honestly though, I would rather be in Tasmania starting my internship. I’m with like fifteen other people who are doing different internships through out Australia and they are mostly all nice people, but I feel like this is vacationy stuff and I would rather do vacationy stuff with people like my family or close friends. So far these people have mostly talked about how they are really excited to hit all the bars and party. One girl who actually happens to be from my hometown (I don’t know her though.. it was one of those “So where are you from?” “Valencia, CA” “....Are you serious??”...etc.) was even saying how grateful she is that she isn’t living with an Australian family because she wouldn’t be able to bring boys home. This boy in our group got a bag full of free booze from a flight attendant because his tv on the fourteen hour flight didn’t work. He has been taking shots since we got to the hotel. Ha. It’s all very thrilling, except that I could care less for all that. So I just really want to go be in Tasmania at the zoo and start all that. I’m trying to stay positive about all of this.
Anywaaaay, how about more on my billion hour flight? So I got on my first flight, the fourteen hour one, and I ended up sitting next to this really attractive guy. Dark, long, curly ish hair. Bright blue eyes. Little bit of scruff. We didn’t talk the whole flight except for when he let me use his pen and when he needed me to move so he could get out. Ha. He also ended up falling asleep and his head fell on my shoulder. I of course did not get any sleep whatsoever because a Jewish guy sitting in front of me reclined his seat all the way back before the plane even started to move. I had zero space and was uncomfortable and wanted to sleep, but couldn’t fall asleep. It was sad. So we land in Brisbane fourteen hours later, and then cute guy starts talking to me. He has fourteen hours to talk to me and he didn’t strike up a conversation until we were heading to the baggage claim. Of course he was a little less attractive once he started talking because he felt it was necessary to drop the f bomb every other word. We parted ways and the passport stamper guy talked to me like I was really suspicious, but now I have another stamp in my passport! I had to get my bags and re check them and while I was in line to re check them, I was looking around and saw three boys in suits with name tags! Hahah. I chatted with them about their upcoming missions and stuff for a little bit. It was precious. I had to go get on a bus to go to the domestic terminal after that and as soon as I got outside of the airport to find the bus the humidity made my beautifully straight hair fluff up and look silly. The missionary boys ended up being on the same bus as me so I sat with them and chatted some more. We were buds. Finally, I got to the domestic terminal to catch my flight from Brisbane to Cairns and I went through security, but before heading to my gate a security guy stopped me and said that he randomly selected me for an explosive residue test. The Australians must think I look untrustworthy or something. Ha. So he poked me and my stuff with a weird stick thing and then let me go finally. This flight was only two ish hours long so it wasn’t bad at all. I was stuck sitting next to a weird guy that had tattoos all over him. They were really ugly too. One was a skull with a sword flying out of its mouth... which sounds cooler than it looked.. Haha. I got to Cairns safely and met up with some of the program leader guys and got on a bus and now I’m in a tiny hotel room wanting to be at a zoo.
Oh also, a boy here brought two suitcases that are bigger than my biggest suitcase PLUS another smaller suitcase. A BOY. I was sad I didn’t bring another suitcase.
Oh and one more thing, on the Qantas airlines safety instruction sheet thing, there is a picture of a furby in the electronics picture. Heh.
That’s what today is. It’s a for real holiday. I don’t know what it’s for though. The girl that I’m living with for the next ten weeks does. She didn’t tell me. I know, she’s a peach. Anyway...
I’M IN AUSTRALIA!
...And I already have like three mosquito bites! It’s so exciting! Haha. I’m currently in Cairns for a few days for an orientationy type thing. It is really beautiful here and I really love it. Honestly though, I would rather be in Tasmania starting my internship. I’m with like fifteen other people who are doing different internships through out Australia and they are mostly all nice people, but I feel like this is vacationy stuff and I would rather do vacationy stuff with people like my family or close friends. So far these people have mostly talked about how they are really excited to hit all the bars and party. One girl who actually happens to be from my hometown (I don’t know her though.. it was one of those “So where are you from?” “Valencia, CA” “....Are you serious??”...etc.) was even saying how grateful she is that she isn’t living with an Australian family because she wouldn’t be able to bring boys home. This boy in our group got a bag full of free booze from a flight attendant because his tv on the fourteen hour flight didn’t work. He has been taking shots since we got to the hotel. Ha. It’s all very thrilling, except that I could care less for all that. So I just really want to go be in Tasmania at the zoo and start all that. I’m trying to stay positive about all of this.
Anywaaaay, how about more on my billion hour flight? So I got on my first flight, the fourteen hour one, and I ended up sitting next to this really attractive guy. Dark, long, curly ish hair. Bright blue eyes. Little bit of scruff. We didn’t talk the whole flight except for when he let me use his pen and when he needed me to move so he could get out. Ha. He also ended up falling asleep and his head fell on my shoulder. I of course did not get any sleep whatsoever because a Jewish guy sitting in front of me reclined his seat all the way back before the plane even started to move. I had zero space and was uncomfortable and wanted to sleep, but couldn’t fall asleep. It was sad. So we land in Brisbane fourteen hours later, and then cute guy starts talking to me. He has fourteen hours to talk to me and he didn’t strike up a conversation until we were heading to the baggage claim. Of course he was a little less attractive once he started talking because he felt it was necessary to drop the f bomb every other word. We parted ways and the passport stamper guy talked to me like I was really suspicious, but now I have another stamp in my passport! I had to get my bags and re check them and while I was in line to re check them, I was looking around and saw three boys in suits with name tags! Hahah. I chatted with them about their upcoming missions and stuff for a little bit. It was precious. I had to go get on a bus to go to the domestic terminal after that and as soon as I got outside of the airport to find the bus the humidity made my beautifully straight hair fluff up and look silly. The missionary boys ended up being on the same bus as me so I sat with them and chatted some more. We were buds. Finally, I got to the domestic terminal to catch my flight from Brisbane to Cairns and I went through security, but before heading to my gate a security guy stopped me and said that he randomly selected me for an explosive residue test. The Australians must think I look untrustworthy or something. Ha. So he poked me and my stuff with a weird stick thing and then let me go finally. This flight was only two ish hours long so it wasn’t bad at all. I was stuck sitting next to a weird guy that had tattoos all over him. They were really ugly too. One was a skull with a sword flying out of its mouth... which sounds cooler than it looked.. Haha. I got to Cairns safely and met up with some of the program leader guys and got on a bus and now I’m in a tiny hotel room wanting to be at a zoo.
Oh also, a boy here brought two suitcases that are bigger than my biggest suitcase PLUS another smaller suitcase. A BOY. I was sad I didn’t bring another suitcase.
Oh and one more thing, on the Qantas airlines safety instruction sheet thing, there is a picture of a furby in the electronics picture. Heh.
EEK!
Monday, January 24, 2011
I'm leaving for the airport soon!!!!!!!! I cannot believe that I'm actually doing this. Seriously, who just goes to Australia for ten weeks to work at a zoo? It seems sooo unreal still. I probably won't even believe that this ever happened. I'll come home and people will be like "Hey how was Australia?" and I'll be like "Oh how did you know I had a dream about going to Australia?! Are you like psychic? Cool!" I'm SOOO FREAKING EXCITED! This is a completely pointless post! I really just wanted to talk about how excited I am..
Today I looked up the time difference. I'm going to be 19 hours in the future! I guess 18 hours in the future from Utah. So I'll report back about how the future looks. It's probably cool. Whatevs.
I am really going to miss everyone in Utah and my family and stuff, but I can feel how great this is going to be for me in so many ways. I'm really happy that I'm getting this opportunity even though I'm going to miss out on lots of fun things with my people. It's definitely going to be worth it!
:D
Today I looked up the time difference. I'm going to be 19 hours in the future! I guess 18 hours in the future from Utah. So I'll report back about how the future looks. It's probably cool. Whatevs.
I am really going to miss everyone in Utah and my family and stuff, but I can feel how great this is going to be for me in so many ways. I'm really happy that I'm getting this opportunity even though I'm going to miss out on lots of fun things with my people. It's definitely going to be worth it!
:D
So I'm Like Going To Tasmania.. and Stuff..
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Hi Friends. I was told that I should make a blog for my adventures so that I don't have to answer a billion of the same questions when I get back or something. I'm really awful and writing and blogging and being consistent at anything, but I'm going to try really hard for all you lovely folks who care, which is like two. So enjoy!
So I'll let you know how I'm feeling about this whole thing. I'm freaking terrified out of my mind. I've never done anything like this. Moving to a new COUNTRY... BY MYSELF.. for TEN WEEKS. Yeaaaaaaah, I'm scared. I know it's going to be a super amazing experience for me, but you all have to admit that it's kind of an intimidating thing. I'm the biggest stress case in the world so the things that go through my mind right now about this internship are along the lines of "ohmygoshhhhhh I'm not going to have any friends!" and "...everyone's going to hate me" and "I'm going to suck at this job..". I know that once I get there and start experiencing everything, it will all be better and less stressful! Hopefully. I'm probably just as excited as I am terrified so some other things that have been going through my mind are "LKSJFLKSDJL:KSDJFLKSDJF" and "I GET TO FEED COOL ANIMALS!!!!!!!" and "I GET TO LIVE IN TASMANIA!!!!" and "I'm going to make lots of new exciting tazzie friends and have a billion cools experiences and learn funny tasmanian slang to teach my roommates!". Clearly my thoughts are conflicted. Ha. This is going to be one of the greatest experiences ever for me and I'm really excited to tell you guys about it! I love you all!
Yeaah, this is a tiny post, but in my defense.. I'm not in Tasmania yet.
Love,
Caitlin Lamb aka Clamb... I'm not sure how to sign things..
P.S. For those of you who are curious and did not already know, the title of my blog is a play off of a song title. "Tales of Girls, Boys and Marsupials" by the Wombats. Curiosity assuaged! You're welcome.
P.P.S. I love when you're listening to a song that you feel totally describes your life at that moment. This song only sort of works, but it came on just now and the first line is "Oh well in 5 years time we could be walking around a zoo with the sun shining down over me and youuu". It's not five years.. but I'm going to be walking around a zoo soon! Yeah I know that is kind of a stretch because a lot of people could be going to a zoo soon.. but I don't care. Also, it's a very fun happy song. "5 Years Time" by Noah and the Whale.
So I'll let you know how I'm feeling about this whole thing. I'm freaking terrified out of my mind. I've never done anything like this. Moving to a new COUNTRY... BY MYSELF.. for TEN WEEKS. Yeaaaaaaah, I'm scared. I know it's going to be a super amazing experience for me, but you all have to admit that it's kind of an intimidating thing. I'm the biggest stress case in the world so the things that go through my mind right now about this internship are along the lines of "ohmygoshhhhhh I'm not going to have any friends!" and "...everyone's going to hate me" and "I'm going to suck at this job..". I know that once I get there and start experiencing everything, it will all be better and less stressful! Hopefully. I'm probably just as excited as I am terrified so some other things that have been going through my mind are "LKSJFLKSDJL:KSDJFLKSDJF" and "I GET TO FEED COOL ANIMALS!!!!!!!" and "I GET TO LIVE IN TASMANIA!!!!" and "I'm going to make lots of new exciting tazzie friends and have a billion cools experiences and learn funny tasmanian slang to teach my roommates!". Clearly my thoughts are conflicted. Ha. This is going to be one of the greatest experiences ever for me and I'm really excited to tell you guys about it! I love you all!
Yeaah, this is a tiny post, but in my defense.. I'm not in Tasmania yet.
Love,
Caitlin Lamb aka Clamb... I'm not sure how to sign things..
P.S. For those of you who are curious and did not already know, the title of my blog is a play off of a song title. "Tales of Girls, Boys and Marsupials" by the Wombats. Curiosity assuaged! You're welcome.
P.P.S. I love when you're listening to a song that you feel totally describes your life at that moment. This song only sort of works, but it came on just now and the first line is "Oh well in 5 years time we could be walking around a zoo with the sun shining down over me and youuu". It's not five years.. but I'm going to be walking around a zoo soon! Yeah I know that is kind of a stretch because a lot of people could be going to a zoo soon.. but I don't care. Also, it's a very fun happy song. "5 Years Time" by Noah and the Whale.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)