Strawberry Fields Forever

Lots of random thoughts...spent the entire weekend exploring the CBD of this sprawling urban metropolis. The iconic Melbourne figure has to be Flinder's Street Station, the hub of the city. It is across from St. Paul's Cathedral and down the street from Federation Square.

The rest of the city oozes Victorian architecture and feel...fitting since I am in the state of Victoria...

The Crown Casino was a site to see, it felt like i was trapped in Vegas again. Went up to the Rialto Towers, the highest point in Melbun and got some fantastic views of the city.

Explored the Greek Precinct (Lonsdale), had some great thai food, and considered going into an Asian Karaoke place for some bubble tea. Really discovered China town on Bourke Street on Sunday morning for a great Dim Sum experience...prawn dumplings are just amazing. The comedy festival being held all month was in its last night and we caught the very last show...i actually get aussie jokes now and i'm not sure that I can even notice the acent anymore. I have started saying: "Do you reckon..." and also "What do you reckon?". I have caught myself saying "yah?" after sentences more than "hey?". ie: "You heard that thingo, yah?"

As for school - yuck...the only thing that makes me happy right now is how perfectly everything fits into my extra huge Roxy pencil case. My TI83+ calculator has never been so happy.

Surfing Culture...i knew i would get sucked in. So far i've accumulated:

• Rip Curl: Hat, keychain
• Billabong: Bathers (bikini), Backpack
• Cult: Bathers
• Roxy: Jumper (hoody), pencil case
• Havaianas: thongs (flip flops)

It was inevitable! I love surf culture and the laid back ease of it's style. Supporting St. Kilda Saints or Essendon Bombers in AFL - still undecided. Got both scarves because i liked the colors! tee hee hee. Played footy for the first time! it was spot on.

Oh ya and a quick more personal observation... phonetically, people here dont call me "meen-ah" (softly, gently). They call me "MAIN-ah" (roughly, crudely). Its so odd! I'll try to teach them how to say it "right" and it just doesnt work. So i've now resorted to introducing myself as "main-ah" (softly, gently) to try to make it easier for them to make the transition.

Cake shop in St. Kilda on Acland Street. This place has a ton of bakeries!

*nb: Something i found quite amusing...The Ladoo Shop- Ludikrishna style (a parody of fiddy's Candy Shop).

The Best of Queensland!

Its 2 am - exam tomorrow in Reaction Mechanisms...the unit i always fall asleep in. But ironically, i have too much caffeine in my system and I can't sleep! I was relying on the book to put me to sleep but its some sort of twisted poetic justice. Anywho i figured i may as well update - if i wait any longer i'll feel like it was all a dream. Queensland sure does seem like it was lifetimes ago...what can i say, i have this love-hate relationship with engineering. *sigh* back 2 life - back to reality - stay in school kids.

BRISBANE

We flew into brissy on April 13th, the start of a new adventure! Went down to Southbank - talked about it in previous posts...it was so warm - the temp difference between Victoria and cities in Queensland is just incredible! For those of you who dun-noi, in N. America we fly down south for the winter, here they fly up north :) Below is a picture of the ghettoist elevator EVER at Palace Backpackers Hostel- its a manual operating elevator, and it really can't be safe...it just doesn’t seem stable! It looks like it came right out of a cheesy horror flick.


HERVEY BAY

From Brissy we caught the greyhound early morning to go to Hervey Bay...we were supposed to stop in Noosa to do some surfing but it didn’t work out...needless to say after a 7 hour greyhound trip without a Noosa stop we arrived in Hervey Bay quite cranky! Our camping trip to Fraser island was scheduled to leave the next day.

FRASER ISLAND


It is said that the sand from the east coast of Oz eventually ends up in Fraser Island. Its a gigantinourmous sandbar measuring 120 km by 15 km. It seems too lush and green to be the world’s biggest sand island, but that is due to the island's diverse ecology. it is dotted with about 200 fresh water lakes and contains rainforests and towering sand dunes. These "sandblows" tower up to 224 m tall, and "allegedly" the island contains more sand than the Sahara. The sea is lethal, containing undertows and man eating sharks...but looking up in the sky at night will take away all your worries...you can actually see the Milky Way blazing.

We got a 4wd Toyota we rightly named the "Sexy Beast". A little rough around the edges, leaky, unstable, but it got us around! We were given a map, tents, sleeping bags, and tide times...and set off to navigate the island on our own. Lots of beautiful lakes, lots of off-roading. We set up camp at a random spot along the beach, and spent most of the evening having some insane conversations that only happen when there is nothing around to distract you but the full moon and the tide rolling in. Politics, religion, life, death, extra terrestrial life...all the good stuff haha. We were even lucky enough to see 2 Dingos pass by our camp. Just glad i didnt see one while we were digging pee holes! (yes i was really roughing it .... with only 2 sets of clothes and no shower for 3 days). The last night was crazy because there was a huge storm...our crappy tents were leaking and there was a point in time when i looked up at the top of the very teeny 3 person tent and thought it would collapse because of the wind - it was quite scary for a bit. Thank God the rain caught up to us on the last day rather than the first! Anyways ya nature is good and all - camping was fun BUT its hard work! putting up tents, cooking, sleeping on a vine in your back, seeing little transparent crabs ranging from 1 cm to a fist size....I can do it but I cant say I particularly LOVED it! In any case it was nice to go back to civilization...and shower...


AIRLIE BEACH

12 hours of a greyhound later, we arrived in Airlie beach... a cute little town with a perfectly manicured man made beach much like Southbank. We couldn’t go into the ocean water because of the stingers this time, not the sharks! Had a great night with the people we were sharing our dorm with - played Kings and made everyone say "Go Canada" a lot - its great hearing it in different accents, especially Irish! Actually it became "Go bloody Canada" after a while. Anywho, a night on the town is just what was needed after camping for 3 days. The next morning we got ready to leave for sailing.

WHITSUNDAY SAILING


Our boat was called the Kora, and we were departing Airlie with 2 other ships. Pulling into South Molle (pronounced Mole) Island I felt as though i was entering Jurassic park. It looked like lush green untouched land....it was just bliss. Beautiful palm trees with coconuts that you could just crack open and eat, and tons of lorikeets everywhere! The next 2 days we went sailing and snorkeling. One of the best parts was sailing to Whitehaven beach, which is just gorgeous...white silica sands and turquoise waters...paradise on earth!









Sailing was definitely the highlight of my trip...met so many different people from so many different places - and it really makes the world feel smaller. Its amazing how many people travel alone and how interesting it is to sit and talk to them and hear their stories. Living life as a backpacker is so unique...you have a chance to be yourself completely, or to reinvent yourself - whatever floats your boat. In these small clusters of time you meet people that you become so close to, and you completely become a part of each others lives. You form globalized "crews"...you eat together, relax together, talk, party. Then all of a sudden everyone goes their separate ways and you know inside when you say goodbye that you probably wont ever see them again. You cant have a soft heart, because every thing that passes through your life is in flux. Its like life is flowing and you try to root your feet in the ground to grasp on to a moment and live it before it slips away...but ultimately every breath you take is one less breath...so carpe diem!






DAINTREE RAINFOREST

It was quite sad leaving Airlie, but leave we had to and we took another 9 hour greyhound to Cairns. We arrived there early morning and got picked up by a small tour van, called Cape Tribulation Connections. Our friendly driver took us bushwalking, and then to Cape Kimberly- a beautiful quiet place a nestled in the heart of the Daintree Rainforest. The Daintree is a World Heritage listed rainforest, and it has amazing amounts of biodiversity. Its the Earth's oldest standing rainforest! Oh yes, and vines twist the other way on this side of the world, anti clockwise. (for geeks: Coriolis Effect)

There was a huge cyclone that passed through northern Queensland just a day or two before we got there, so everything was flooded and people were stuck in Cape Kimberly. When they got the fairy working, everyone left the area. So basically, when we got to Cape Kimberly, we were the only 4 people on the resort! It was complete isolation, and we had no idea what to do! So we ran around on the beach that we had all to ourselves, and wrote things in the sand. At one point in time we were messing around, and we wrote a big HELP sign on the sand, then we actually saw a helicopter coming above us so we scrambled to try to "erase" it...and the helicopter kept going...i wonder if it would have worked? Anywho after nothing else to do we retired to the empty lounge and played board games...Australian Monopoly, Trouble, and Texas hold em...the experience of staying in a remote area of the jungle was really neat...more than once we busted out in a chorus of "in the jungle the mighty jungle the lion sleeps tonight..."




The next day we got picked up and taken to PK's Jungle Village in Cape Tribulation...again it was exciting to see CIVILIZATION, as little as it was! There was even a mini grocery store and a chemist (pharmacy)! But that’s about it. That day we went Jungle Surfing, which was incredible. Basically we ziplined through the Daintree...I felt like i was on Amazing Race! It was beautiful being so high up in an area that looked the same way millions of years ago, when dinosaurs roamed. The team that was guiding us was so well learned on the area and everything around us had a story. The upside down zipline was the most fun. The next day we tried to find one of the "watering holes" to swim in (I really felt like i was in the Lion King) but it was soooo muddy! Then we left for Cairns again.

GREAT BARRIER REEF

I'm sure most of you have heard of the Great Barrier Reef...its larger than the Great Wall of China and the only living thing visible from space. It is one of the seven wonders of the natural world! As the planet's biggest reef system, it has more biodiversity than the rainforest! We took a boat out of Cairns and sailed to the reef to snorkel at two different sites...it was just amazing. Psychedelic colored glowing fish, electric blue with huge lips, bright yellow, zebra stripes...and tons of different colored coral reef...it was just another world all together. Which Disney soundtrack did I have stuck in my head this time...? You guessed it, Under the Sea! I really felt like Ariel except my hair is now a sun bleached brown rather than red!





From Cairns we flew back to cold cold Melbourne...but it was nice to sleep in my own bed after so long. Queensland was heaps of fun...it is such a beautiful tropical splice of paradise...everyone should see it!! Okay really time to go to bed now! Right-o!

Back in M-town

Just got back from backpacking queensland - not enough time to write about my whole trip but i'll leave a couple of pics for those of you who have been asking! will update soon :)

(more Fraser Island pics avail in "more trip pix")

Fraser Island trip - the largest sand island in the world! this is the safari 4WD we navigated the island with.

Fraser Island sand highway

Campsite on the beach

freedom - in the moment

Jungle surfing - my name was Gonzo

My favorite zipline - upside down

90 feet above ground, overlooking the World Heritage Listed Daintree Rainforest - the oldest rainforest on earth with unchanged climate...dinosaurs roamed here...right where i jungle surfed!

stories and more pics to follow...

.nostalgia.

Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road
Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go
So make the best of this test, and don't ask why
It's not a question, but a lesson learned in time
It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right
I hope you had the time of your life...
So take the photographs, and still frames in your mind
Hang it on a shelf in good health and good time
Tattoos of memories and dead skin on trial
For what it's worth it was worth all the while
It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right

I hope you had the time of your life.

This song has been echoing in my head for the last little while...i almost feel like I'm the one graduating...it feels weird being all the way here, while everyone else back home has come to that fork in the road. Spain, Euro-trips, grad school, job offers--different provinces, different countries...everybody seems to be moving on...moving along. In a way a small part of me is glad that I am not back home...it would be heart wrenching to have to document that last walk from ginos, that last study sesh at dc, that last night at rev...

I've been having these crazy feelings of nostalgia lately, thinking about what it will be like when i leave Waterloo and take that next step into life...when all of a sudden you become that responsible adult...no more sleeping in, no more late, late random nights, no more making cookies at 3 in the morning, no more chasing mice around the house. Easy Mac? I cant give that up...what about the crazy landlord brawls, and trying to find change for the laundry machine? Nights at Phils, then louies, galaxy theatre, free pizza coupons, trips to the dollerama to pimp out our rooms, filthys, long line ups at rev always trying to get vip...exams you didnt think you'd get through, classes you just slept through, starting up the Survivor to drive to the Bomber in the winter, walking home in 6 feet of snow, setting off the fire alarm in Beck Hall, those pure chilled nights involving fabreeze, watching hours of Sex & the City, middle of the night breakdowns, saturday morning conversations...for what its worth it was really worth all the while.

Funny how years of uni wont change you but will grow you; how the people you meet are part of this mosaic that is life. How somehow you call this patchwork quilt your own as you walk through in your forever changing identity on this stage that is your existence. I think about who i was when i got to UW, and who I am now...and how the hell i got here, on the other side of the globe. It was something unpredictable, but in the end was right...

And I really had the time of my life.

A Day in the Life of a Monash Engineer

After many requests, I have finally decided to detail what it is like to be in school here. I actually went around with a camera today and documented what a typical day is like in pictures. I was trying to do it undercover so people wouldn't think I was completely nuts, and my plan was to go incognito with huge glasses and a big hat. Then i figured that "meena-style incognito" may not be the best idea - with my zebra print Billabong bag it just wouldnt work...

*NB: The day chosen is a hypothetical day combining schedules for Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday units(course = unit, faculty = course).


I wake up in the morning after snoozing precisely 4 times. It is at this moment that I realize that uni is really cutting into my vacation time, and I really need to get my act together and start reading my textbooks! I make some brekky (toast/jam, dood/cereal, bagel/cream cheese - ozzies dont know what bagels are and they are really hard to find here so i only reward myself with a bagel if i really feel as though i deserve it). Then I get ready and set off from Farrer Hall, my residence.

I start walking towards an extra long path that passes by a pond with ducks and has tons of trees - really looking forward to autumn to see all the colors changing. It's pretty chilly in the morning - so they were right when they said Melbs gets cold...I need to buy a scarf soon.

9 minutes later, I cross the local footy field and see Engineering in the distance--I am already 7 minutes late. No matter how early I get up or how much extra time I leave myself in the morning, I am consistently 7 minutes late every single morning.

I enter the 4th Year Room for my CHE 4113: Management for Engineers course. All of my third year courses are held in one room--conveniently named the Third Year Room.

The Marketing course fully puts me to sleep without fail, so after an hour of it I need to go grab a coffee. But there is no decent coffee in Australia! So I am currently living off of Chai Lattes at my new favorite cafe called Fibonacci's. For those of you that are geeky you will know what a Fibonacci Sequence is-and if you look carefully you can see it on the counter (1,1,2,3,5,8...). Yup, you guessed right - this is the cafe in the Engineering Library. Its like some next level geek - i didnt think anyone could do it better than Waterloo but i was sadly mistaken!

After I grab my coffee, I am late for the second half of class (usually by approx 7 minutes) and I take a nice scenic walk back to class, passing a calming water fountain on the way.

When marketing class is finished, I head to the 3rd year room for CHE 3102: Heat and Mass Transfer. Are we learning Heat and Mass transfer today? I'm afraid not! This is really just a repeat of a Transport Process course I took in 2nd year (helllooo Chatzis). Its basically just in case I one day come across a feed stream concentrated with ammonia that i need to strip out using a solvent and the plant depends on my calculations but, oh look, we have no more analytical software so i have to analyze the process by drawing a graph by hand of the amount of theoretical distillation trays needed! Seriously - not impressed. Are we EVER going to use this stuff? You know, i wasnt always so cynical...oh ya but i got a sweet as (kiwi slang) Roxy pencil case that fits my assortment of stationary, chapstick, my 30 cm ruler AND also my TI-83. I am in LOVE with this pencil case!

After class, I take a picture by a fish tank which is really a distillation column with fishies in it. Just when you thought the Chemical Engineering Department couldn't get nerdier. But the sad part is that when i first realized it was a distilation column, i was actually impressed...

Anywho, moving right along, yes that is a chai latte in my hand, full of cinnaminny goodness!

After a long morning its time for lunch - I am immediately craving handrolls. Handrolls are yummy yummy sushi rolls that are long and only $2.20 - I eat them almost everyday. Its kind of scary. So we walk down the path to the Monash Meeting Point in the Campus Center (SLC/MAC Hall). Note how people walk on the "other" side of the path.

Before I got to Australia, I really thought that I wouldnt have to do much work here. But I now realize that the University of Waterloo and Monash are pretty comparable in the course load and teaching styles, however a hell of a lot more people fail here. In fact, about 50% of my class are fourth years doing their courses over again. As you can imagine, that is not very encouraging. I'm not sure if its the lecturers or the students...

When lunch is over, we walk back towards the engineering building for CHE 3108 - Process Operation and Design. This course is a 4th year UW course and basically covers process design, materials engineering, flowsheeting and all the other good stuff.

Then I have CHE 3101: Reaction Engineering. I can't even describe this course because I have absolutely no idea what is going on. I do know that it is about reaction rates and reaction kinetics and that my lecturer has a voice that seroiusly just lulls you to dreamland. Its one of those courses where the lectures are so useless but you still end up going - it's a trade off, of course, as the best naps usually happen during those times. And just when you think you can start skipping lectures...he starts taking attendence. What a guy.

Next stop - time to leave the engineering building! Bye, bye distillation columns, its off to the nicer and better looking part of campus - Arts! This course AUS 1060: Contemporary Australia is basically made for American exchange students and it covers Australian culture, history, underlying racism, aborigines, and the Howard Govt...basically Bush's little poochri. It is pretty interesting but I do think I now know more about Australia then actual Australians do...most australians are more concerned with footy and they "couldnt be bothered" (aussie slang) to learn about history. In real life, this unit conflicts with my CHE 3108 so I have to pick and choose which I want to go to depending on the week.

Then, finally, it is time for my trek back to Farrer Lords. Home sweet home!


Get home, cook dinns, watch endless amounts of tv on a laptop (LOST is my current fixation), go to sleep and do it all over again the next day!

The Mailbox - A post for Mr. T. Horton

I miss...my mailbox and everything it represents. I can close my eyes right now and repeat the motions in my head and feel like i'm actually in my little chevy cavalier with the very adolescent looking red/yellow/orange steering wheel cover and fluffy heart seat pillows (so i can see over the wheel). Pass Superstore, pass my pink elementary school, turn at the poo/pee house, turn again, drive up to my culd-e-sac, slow down/stop at my mailbox, depending on who's in my company...have those last peices of conversation for the evening, or a long drawn out discussion on the nature of human existance...spot a bunny or two racing away as my garage opens...

I miss...11:00 Timmy's sit-ins drinking French Vanillas and eating a plain toasted bagel with plain cream cheese and tomatoes...I miss playing hockey with pink hockey tape on 2 sticks in the gym...I miss Saturday morning drives to Airways with mandatory coffee stops...I miss watching useless tv like Flava Flav's Flava of Love, Blind Date, and Elimidate...I miss always being late and running out of the house profusely apologizing while simultaneously making up lame excuses holding an assortment of cut fruits in my hands (c/o my wonderful mother) for the road...I miss wearing Oxford sweatshirts way too big for me (still too big - even after a failed shrinking attempt)...and i really miss the lyrical battles - pop pop - bring in all of the masses! And although Australia is wonderful... I mean Melbourne is a beautiful city full of life and culture...i dont even have a mailbox here, much less a mail "slot" i have to share with other people that have surnames starting with "N". I cant have conversations by my mail slot, nor do i see white fluffers at the end of my evening. So For all of these reasons + Tim Horton, home is where my heart is!