Day 114

Today was one of the biggest fail days of my life. I had all these dreams of how the perfect situation would lay out, and NOTHING did. Let me explain.

So I woke up this morning knowing I had a very busy day ahead of me. I first had to go to my genes and genomes problem session, which I usually go to the session on Friday, but as I'm going to be on a plane to Tasmania this friday, I went today. My first problem was actually FINDING the lecture theatre, since when I got to the place where I thought the lecture was going to be held, there was no one waiting outside. As I turned to leave and go find a computer to see if the location had been changed, I hear a "So you decided to actually come to a problem session?" and immediately my stomach drops. I turned to see the one and only jerkface standing in front of me, leaning against the side of the stairwell. I ignored his comment and asked him if this is where the session is, which he confirmed so I turned around and sat down on a bench, putting my jacket on one side of me and my backpack on the other so there was no possible way he could get close to me. He did his best, sitting next to my backpack, and started asking whether I had actually done the problem set before the class. Obviously, douchebag, otherwise I wouldn't have been here. Luckily I only had to make awkward small talk for a short time before we were let into the theatre and I purposely sat on the opposite side of the room as him. I had escaped, but just barely.

I then ran to the ERC to get a new uni ID since my old one was warped and now lost completely, and got my ticket and went to sit down. My stomach dropped yet again when I saw I was number 78, and they were on 45. So I sat and sat, and finally after 40 minutes my number was called. I went and explained the situation, and the woman said I had to pay 30 dollars to get a new one. WHY DOES A LITTLE CARD COST 30 DOLLARS?! I was outraged, especially since I never even USE my card since my last one was so warped it literally was useless. But I reluctantly gave in, seeing as exams are crazy legit here and you need to have your uni card on your desk when you're taking your exams or something for identification. So annoying.

After that excursion, I ran to catch the tram to Brunswick to find a raincoat for Tasmania. I literally went to every store I could think of to find a raincoat and NOTHING. I even went down into the CBD to look at target, big w, even myers (the huge department store with things WAY out of my price range) and sports stores and it seems that Australians just don't wear raincoats. Which is absurd for how much it rains here. By the time I was ready to give up, it was 4 hours later and I had to run to class. I made it just in time, sat through my last human-animal interactions lecture, and then had to run to work.

Work was pretty normal today. Two big families came in that were both friends of my bosses so they told me to take care of them. I was doing brilliantly if I say so myself, and got each order exactly right. Both tables ordered a TON of food, so I was sure they would add 5 or 10 dollars onto the end of the bill. Nothing. I had spent all this effort actually being a good waitress, and I got nothing. Even more ironic is the table of 3 chinese people I spent next to zero time on since all they ordered was a pizza, THEY gave me a 5 dollar tip. The lesson I'm taking out of this is that if I try really hard, I won't get a tip, but if I barely put in an effort, it's possible. Ah well, at least I didn't get yelled at tonight! So I guess my day wasn't a complete fail, only a partial fail!

Day 112

So I have been failing with this whole, writing every day thing. The thing is that I literally have NOTHING interesting to talk about! Every activity that other people are doing I can't do because I'm either working or in class, and as soon as I have free time, nothing is going on so I just study. At least I'm making a good amount of money every week and gaining about 15 dollars in tips a night (nothing compared to this douchebag I work with who takes everyone elses tips -- he makes about 100 a night. I WONDER WHY. We all hate him and one of my highlights of the night is just talking with everyone in the restaurant -- cooks, bartenders, waiters/waitresses alike -- about how much we hate him). All that's keeping me going in this job is knowing that it's the reason I was able to do such awesome things like skydiving and Tasmania and snorkeling with cuttlefish. Only a few more weeks and then I'll be done and ready to just have fun in Australia again!

But something absolutely ridiculous did happen last night at the restaurant. So I was working inside all night which was absolutely dead since it was so hot out, but then got switched to working outside when one of the girls went home. I walk out and the first thing my coworker says to me is YOU TAKE 41, I CAN'T TAKE IT. I looked over and thought, okay, it's a big table of 8 people, she might have just had a long day. So I go over there and ask if they'd like anything to drink, and they all start cracking up histerically. It took me about 2 seconds to realize they were all high off their asses on something to the point where one of them couldn't even talk legibly. The rest of them could speak just fine, but because of the nonstop giggling it took a good 20 minutes to get their entire order because they kept just telling me they wanted "pasta". We have probably over 60 different kinds of pasta combinations. That table was definitely a struggle to get through, but at the end they left me 10 dollars in coins and an array of lollies! The lollies I decided to pass on seeing as I would not be surprised in the slightest if they were spiked with heroin, but the 10 dollars was definitely appreciated.

Now it is officially our last week of school, and even though I got next to no sleep last night I still decided to get up and go to my 9am class to get some good karma for the week. The universe repaid me by making it rain the entire walk over here and now not even 30 people are here in my class of over 200 students. And we're learning material that I've already learned before. This makes me highly doubtful of this karma thing.

Day 108- Karaoke!

Last night was one of the most fun nights of this entire trip BY FAR. The entire Arcadia crew went out to this bowling alley and rented a room for karaoke for our friend's birthday. I was kind of scared people weren't going to be into it and just sit back and it'd be really awkward, but it wasn't at all! My friend and I started the night off right by singing Last Night by the Strokes and everyone was cheering and singing along and laughing and having the best time ever! It made it even better that the venue provided costumes, so i spent the entire night with sparkly pink antennae on my head while other costumes like fairy princesses, 80s rockers with gaga masks, and Army pants were worn. We ended up staying until the place closed even though we only paid for 2 hours, but we were having so much fun who could really stop us? I realized this morning that perhaps the videos and pictures I took probably should not have been taken (I guess belting your heart out to Queen feels a lot better than it looks in pictures) but now I will always have something to crack me up.

I am now one class away from finishing my 2nd to last week of class! It's so crazy that's it's almost over -- part of me feels like it was yesterday and part of me feels like I've been here forever. When we walked downtown yesterday, we all got extremely nostalgic of when we took our first tour of everything and Melbourne seemed so big and scary. Now it feels like home. I'm definitely going to be so sad to leave here and everyone I've gotten to know so well! But I'm not thinking about that yet -- I still have more than 5 weeks!

Classes wise, I'm not worried about this semester in the slightest anymore! I still can't believe I'll have an entire week and a half off to study for my finals, so I feel like it'll be impossible to do that badly on them, especially with the semi-work ethic I've had this semester. I'm definitely excited to have them all over with and just be able to hang out with mah wonderful friends for 2 weeks before we all go home. And since I've persevered through the italian restaurant, I actually have money to do more fun things before I leave! Definitely worth the job this semester -- despite how horribly I was treated sometimes.

Aaand on that happy note, I have run out of things to say!

Day 105!

I made an exclamation point in the title to make my life seem more interesting, but alas it's not. With finals coming up in exactly 3 weeks it is now that time in my life where if I am doing anything but studying I start feeling immensely guilty and lazy. Most of my time lately has been taken up by writing an animal physiology lab report which was just interesting enough to make it my procrastination technique for studying for finals. Yes, I procrastinate studying by doing other homework. I'm quite aware of how lame I am.

As a side note, for family dinner this week, a jewish person in Arcadia cooked us some traditional jewish food and it was so delicious I was practically ready to convert. Okay, not really, but there was this tomato, peppers, onion egg dish that was totally to die for. And for dessert they had these sweetened apple pieces -- yummmm!

Oh! And my life is about to get more interesting! Tomorrow our group is FINALLY going out and singing karaoke in celebration of my friends birthday! It apparently will be in a bowling alley ... legit right? I don't think I'm quite ready to show everyone my immense bowling talent yet, but if forced I may have to show them how I can hit other peoples pins by aiming for my own if I'm lucky...

Day 101 -- Winery Tour!

Yesterday was certainly..interesting. It started off bright and early, heading off to the Yarra Valley for a free wine tour courtesy of the wonderful wine club I'm in. We (my spring break crew and I) took the Melbourne subway trains for the first time ever, and I realized how easily I could get to so many different places around Melbourne. The train only costs 7 dollars for a day pass and with it I can ride any tram, bus, or train in the greater Melbourne area. Blows my mind!

Anyway, we finally get to the Yarra Valley after about an hour train ride and load onto this big bus that takes us to our first stop, Yering Station, Victoria's first vineyard. It was absolutely gorgeous since you could see far off into the distance of the valley every way you turned. We got a tour of the wine making process which was actually really interesting seeing as I know NOTHING about wine. We were able to try as many wines as we wanted, so we really quickly were able to focus on what kinds of wine we like. I, not surprisingly, like the sweetest bubbliest wines, which apparently is very common among new wine drinkers. They kept joking that in no time I'll be drinking a dark dry red with the rest of them. But for now, I'm perfectly fine with my dessert wines and champagne!

The next winery was very different from the first, a small family-owned winery that only opens 2 days a year for tours. Their wine cellar literally is just in the cellar of the house, and they only produce about 1200 bottles of each kind of wine a year. That is absolutely nothing compared to the other wineries we visited. This tasting was especially interesting because they showed us the same wines in different years so we could taste the difference that an extra year makes on these wines. I was actually very surprised of how big of a difference I could tell between the different years. The 2008 chardonnay and the 2010 chardonnay were completely different creatures. And I love that I can say that now and sound like a complete snob.

The last place was by FAR my favourite, but mostly because along with selling wine tours, they have cheese tours. Now there is few things in this world I love more than good cheese, and this was some of the best. They had the biggest list of wines of the three wineries and had a very distinct order in which you should try them in. Apparently you should always try wine lightest to darkest, starting with champagne to cleanse the pallet. Who woulda thought? But it was so delicious and I'm SO happy I got to do this wine tour. Usually they're about 100 dollars at least, which they're easily worth, but I probably wouldn't have done it if it wasn't free.

Cheese platter!

The night ended (after a very long day at work) as wonderful as it started, with a slumber party at my downstairs neighbour’s room! They have so many more channels on their tv than my roommate and I do, so I had so much fun flipping through their channels and freaked out when I saw Buffy!! I screamed and made them watch with me even though they had no idea what was going on and made fun of me endlessly. I didn't even have the guts to tell them I knew it was season 5 episode 12...

Day 98

It has finally gotten beautiful in Melbourne!! It finally is starting to feel like spring, with 70 degree weather and all the leaves returning to the trees! So gorgeous! I even got HOT as I was walking around campus exploring libraries (...cause that's what cool kids do right? Find the different libraries on campus?) But despite the gorgeous weather I somehow ended up indoors for much of the day, rewatching multiple episodes of Game of Thrones with a friend and then going to Brunswick St for the majority of the night. But it was fun nonetheless and the gorgeous weather outside made me happy!

The only problem last night was how inevitable it is to run into people you don't actually want to see when you're on Brunswick St. It was a girls night, with the few minor exceptions of our guy friends who both have girlfriends back home so they're practically one of the girls (don't tell them that) and we went out dancing. There I was, minding my own business, rocking out to Moves like Jagger because that song is amazing, and who walks up but this german guy I talked to very briefly during the Melbourne Welcome. He was a giant skeeze then, and he proved that nothing has changed when he pulled me in for a hug and then said "By the way, I overheard some guys talking about you in the bathroom. They said you were really awesome except you were a midget, so that's your downfall". Thank you german man for giving me this useless information. But at least now I know I'm short, cause ya know, I was kinda shakey on the subject before that.

Now today after taking one look at my genetics assignment due next Friday, I knew I was in trouble. I spent an hour struggling over decifering genetic codes and looking for sites where specific restriction enzymes would cleave the DNA and what the resulting amino acid sequences would be and got through one question. At least I'm starting this a week ahead of time so I actually have time go to into my lecturer and perhaps look like an idiot, but it's obvious that I need help. Only two more weeks of school left!

Day 95

Today was supposed to a totally awesome day where I'd go tour the veterinary hospital and talk with veterinarians about the whole process in Australia. However, all my hopes and dreams were crushed when I realized it started at 6, my class ended at 5:30, and the veterinary hospital is in a zone where the tram doesn't go, and it's a half hour CAR ride. Then, just as I was defeatedly canceling my tour, who calls me but work saying they need me to come in tonight. That will make 5 days I'm working this week, most likely till close every time. Ughhhhhh. I wish I didn't like making money so much, it would make my life so much more fun....

On the bright side, today I was actually productive so I got all my data analyzed and graphed for my huge lab report due in, what, like 3 weeks. Gotta love Australia! And in a couple of weeks I will be venturing around the beautiful lands of Tasmania! Just gotta keep looking ahead.... :)