I'm here!!

I’m in Australia!!! That’s my new favorite phrase! Jenny and Loretta, the girls I traveled with, also enjoy using it. We’ve sort of stuck together, which makes things so so so much easier on me! It’s nice to kind of have someone. Although, that’s the hardest part for me, I don’t really have anyone that’s close to me, nobody really knows me yet. So I don’t have that someone to talk to or be totally normal around you know. We tend to be different people at the start of relationships and once we’ve gotten comfortable you know, and with everyone here, it’s the beginning of that. So that makes it difficult. Back home, I’m the only one missing, but here everyone in my life is missing! That makes the adjustment to the new culture and experience more difficult. But it is just amazing here. I can’t stop thinking to myself, this is incredible. Everything is new and exciting. I’ve never met so many people, they are all different and interesting. Most of the people I’ve met so far are from the US, and a lot are from Kansas, everyone else thinks that is strange! But I didn’t know anybody! Most everyone is really nice and cool, there are only a few I haven’t clicked with at all, but that happens with people. I’ve never challenged myself this much, I am constantly in groups of people where I know nobody! Well, now I do, but you know. There are some really awesome people here. I can’t wait to meet the rest of the international students and all the aussies as well. I’ve met a few of the RA’s, they all seem really nice and relaxed. Of course, that’s a theme here, No Worries, mate. It’s so nice! I love not being so rushed and everything. The US is so fast and convenient. It’s nice to not live like that. It has gotten to be a bit frustrating because it can be hard to find someone to really help us with little things, but overall its so nice to be relaxed about everything all the time!
We’ve had nothing we have to do so far though. One meeting, that’s it. So the first night we were here, there were about 10 people here then, and we all went out to eat at a Thai restaurant. It was scary, I’d never had Thai food, so I was safe and ordered sweet and sour chicken, it was delicious though. We just all talked that night, that happened a lot in the temporary residences, but it was nice. I got to know those people well and they are great. Our RA for the temp res took us to Coles (grocery store like Dillons) and K-Mart to get some things we needed, so that was good. We all just wanted to shower and eat when we got there. Wednesday we had that meeting, the international student advisor lady talked to us about some things we needed to know, and how they’re here to help us. We tried to get out user name and passwords to work too, but that took another two days for some annoying reason. Anyway, they also took us on a tour of campus, so that was really nice. It’s a pretty small campus compared to K-State, but then there are a lot fewer students here too! For how small it is though, there is a whole lot of land here. Things are sort of spread out, especially all the residences, since they only house 5-15 people each and about 500 live on campus. There are three little lakes on campus, and even a nice restaurant. It’s quite gorgeous. There are tennis courts right next to my permanent resi. So that second night we stayed in, some people were drinking, it was a pretty good time, just chatting with everyone and getting to know each other. We went to the store that day as well. Then Thursday, our third day, a bunch of us international students ventured to the grocery store by ourselves on the bus! It was our first adventure and quite successful. Loretta, Jenny and I took a long walk all around campus that day as well, checking it out and taking pictures everywhere, it was nice. Thursday night was our first night out on the town!! It was soooo much fun. We went to a popular club, room 99, and waited outside for an hour to get in. It was a dance club and it was great. They play all american music, but a lot of it was older stuff, like Ice Ice Baby! It was fun, but quite tiring. We got home around 3, and stayed up til 5 chatting. During the days when we sat around talking to each other, we’d watch some TV, but we only got 3 or 4 channels, so we watched some soap operas, some DR. Phil and Oprah, and some cricket, which I don’t understand at all. They have mostly American TV, besides news and sports, but it’s all a season behind. Friday, we three girls went to Torquay, a nearby surfing town. Loretta made friends with a girl last semester who was studying abroad at KSU that lives here in Geelong, so she drove us there and showed us around. We went to the beach and walked along it for awhile, then went to an outlet mall of surf shops and stopped to get some local fish and chips. It was soooo good. The beach was gorgeous, and it smelled good. The water was quite cold, I think that’s normal around here though. The countryside on the way there was interesting, it’s all quite barren right now. They are in the worst draught in decades right now, so everything is very dry. It rained for a little bit yesterday afternoon and evening, but nothing to get too excited about. When we got back from Torquay all the RA’s were back from their training, so we met a bunch of them and hung out with them all night. It was very interesting. I learned so much that night! It was the first time really that I’d been around more than two aussies that were speaking to each other, so they use all their slang and everything. It was hard to follow, they had to explain a lot of things to us! We met some more people that night as well. Saturday a bunch of international students ventured down into town. We are sort of on the outskirts of the city, so we rode the bud into the heart of the city and walked around all day. We hadn’t been besides to go to the club, so we wanted to see it! It is pretty amazing, a very neat downtown. It was fun to walk around with nothing planned or nowhere to go really. We really got to see the city and get lost a little bit to familiarize ourselves a little better. We got to see the water too! We’re in a bay, so it’s not really the ocean, but still pretty cool. We ate lunch on the pier, it was tasty, and our waiter we met goes to our Uni as well! Last night, all the international students and a few RA’s were hanging out in one unit, so that was fun. Every day since Tuesday when we got here, more internationals came all the time. So it’s constantly been meeting them and trying to learn their names and where they’re from. In my temporary unit there was me, Loretta, and Jenny, then Sophia from Sweden, Pete from Germany, Emily from Ontario, Canada, Jordan and Summer from Pittsburgh, Jordan from KSU, Pete from England, and Zach from Hawaii. Heath was our temp RA, he was sort of one of those typical good looking surfer boys, but not much else to him! We moved out of there on Thursday. Most everyone went out last night because there was a band playing at some bar, but I didn’t feel like it. They didn’t go out til 11, so I hung out til then, and there were about 5 of us who didn’t go. We sat around and talked for a little while about nothing, then all went to bed. I’ve been alone in my unit, so it’s a little freaky! I’m such a scaredy cat I don’t like living alone in a big house practically! But it’s okay. And really it is very safe here. Today I didn’t do much for awhile. I spent some time to myself, and then around 1 a bunch of us went into town again to walk around. Us three girls and two people from Michigan went to the mall, we were looking for phones. We also needed a few things, and Jenny and I found some good going out shoes, that are flats!, to wear and bought them. That’s exciting! I like shoes. We were unsuccessful with phones, but were told to go to the grocery store, so we stopped there on the way home. At the mall we also got some food, we got Subway just because we haven’t eaten really well in the past few days and needed something we knew, it was delicious. I’ve been hungry so much lately! So Jenny and I got phones at Cole’s on the way home, they cost $80 for the phone a little bit of prepaid service. I’m not sure how they’ll work out, but we need a phone to get in contact with each other! It’s hard not being able to contact anyone without hoping they are in their room across the way. Plus if we get lost, now we have some way to help ourselves! We went our separate ways this evening when we got home. It’s been a relaxing day.

I just didn’t feel well last night and this morning. The homesickness hit me then. I felt overwhelmed and everything, so much has happened, and I’ve been outside my comfort zone for awhile! But really I was quite comfortable with everyone, I just mean that isn’t normal for me! And not being able to use the internet or call anyone besides to say hello I’m here and good, was very hard for me! I’m used to being able to pick up and call whenever I want. I talked to Brian awhile this morning, and that helped me a whole lot, that’s what I’m used to doing! So that made me feel more normal and more connected to home. My mom also called me! You can call me if you ever want, if you have a phone card I guess.

So after I had a little breakdown about missing home, I felt soooo much better! And today is the first day I haven’t been really tired, I’m finally used to the time change and got a good night’s rest last night. So that helped a lot as well. I don’t think anyone can understand or imagine what this experience is like unless they’ve done it. It’s really crazy. I can’t quite explain it, I’m not even sure I understand my feelings all the time. It’s just so incredible and fun and exciting, but at the same time I can feel very sad and alone. It’s strange. I’ve never felt so many things, it’s been an intense week. But it’s all good in the end, it’s overwhelmingly amazing! I love it here. I’m learning so much already and we don’t start school for two weeks! Well, this was sure a long post, I just wanted to get it all down! I’ll try to write again soon with some interesting differences in words or phrases and some little things I’ve noticed about Australia. Although it seems like the US, there are so many subtle differences that make it seem completely different. It is pretty cool! Hope all is well with everyone back home. I miss you all lots! Have a happy day and keep in touch with me, I need to hear from you as much as I need to send things to you!

Love, Alissa