Journal for hvietmei

Okay, so I’ve been here over four weeks so I’d better get this started. Sheesh! Where has the time gone? In some ways, I feel like I just got here, but at the same time I’m starting to settle in. I recently realized that I’ve made the semantic switch from “my apartment” to “home.” Even though my class schedule is much more convoluted than it ever has been at WU, I almost have it memorized. I’m starting to get my routine down and feel at home in the weight room here. Perhaps best of all, I now have a group of people that I can call “my teammates.” I think most of the people reading this probably have some idea of how much having a team means to me.

Well, I won’t try to re-create everything that’s happened so far, but I’ll do a quick overview.

My apartment is pretty nice for what it is and I’ve gotten used to its more quirky qualities. I have my own room, I get along with my apartment-mates, and I’m only a short walk from campus. Unfortunately, they for some reason group all the exchange students together and even seem to group us by nationality, so I’m forced to be around other Americans a lot of the time. Strangely enough, I feel much more out of place among my fellow American exchange students than I do among the Australians I’ve had the chance to hang out with so far. It’s a different way of living than I would expect from students who should be some of the most conscientious and intelligent people their universities had to offer and should be doing their best to represent their country well, and it sometimes makes me a little worried about the future of the US and the world. I’m beginning to realize what a very small culture I self-select into at home. Those people who frustrate me with their lack of passion, thoughtfulness, and consideration for others aren’t just a few people out of many: they’re almost everyone. All the same, I’m trying to continue to breath, be nice, and look for the best in people.

The classes I’m taking here are:
- BIOL360 Biology of Australian Vertebrates
- BIOL260 The Science of Sex
- ENGL271 Gothic Visions: from Sublime to Suburban Gothic
- HIST109 The Making of Australia
(I should really call them “units” though because when they say “class” here they mean something more like what we mean when we say “section” and technically each lecture and tutorial for a unit during the week is a different class.)

I’m really enjoying my classes, especially English (or Goth class, as I like to refer to it in my head), in which I pretty much get to discuss my geek-dom and call it academic. I’m also getting some really good ideas to “borrow” for my D&D campaign.

The first exciting story: I went on a day hike a week after I got here that ended up in ambulances being called. The hike itself was amazing (lots of pictures on facebook), but our guide was just sort of an odd duck and, it turned out, not super qualified. He managed to get himself so dehydrated that he felt like he was going to throw up and got cramps in his legs to the extent that he didn’t think he could walk the last few kilometers. Personally, I think he was a big baby as well as an idiot, but that’s beside the point. I tried to force him to drink water and eat something salty, but he kept taking like two sips and then going back to whining and moaning. Finally, a few very patient people stayed with him while the rest of us hiked the rest of the way out to the street and called triple zero (911 equivalent). Everything was fine, but we ended up missing the last bus out of there and the school finally had to call and pay for taxies for all of us. The bushwalking club is no longer affiliated with the school gym and it’s “hike at your own risk” now. I don’t think the subsequent walks have been wildly popular.

The other exciting thing I did was that I went to this big benefit concert for the people affected by the bushfires and floods. It was a full 10 hours of music and they pretty much packed both the Sydney cricket grounds, where I was, and the Melbourne cricket grounds. I could have done without some of the people there who didn’t seem to have any understanding of or appreciation for the real reason behind the concert, but overall it was really cool.

Thank you to all of my supporters! I love and appreciate you guys more than I can possibly express!