Surfing and a sad epiphany

I went surfing for the first time yesterday. I awoke early at 6am on Sunday morning and was out the door at 7am. At first I was disappointed because I thought I wouldn’t be able to get to the train in time; I couldn’t find a bus to the train station. I walked up to the shopping centre and found that there was a bus there. Lukily it stopped at Footscray Station. I then caught a train to Geelong and then a bus from Geelong Station to Torquay. I rented a board and wetsuit and hit the waves. I didn’t expect it to be easy, but it was more difficult than I thought. Let’s just say I failed. I went back to the shop and stored my board, put on my shoes, and grabbed some lunch. At two I went back to the shop for my surfing lesson. There was a group of seven of us, not including Chris the instructor. I managed to stand up for about a heartbeat before falling off. I kept trying until it got to the point where I knew if I didn’t go back then I would soon be too tired to swim back. I had a lot of fun and walked away very tired, not to mention sore feet because I forgot my thongs (thongs are what Australians call flip-flops; seriously).

If you’ve read my previous entries you are probably wondering what this means for me moving here. Well, yesterday confirmed it. I’m moving here. [Side note: I mentioned that I didn’t want to move to Melbourne in a previous post. I’m not so sure now. I’d very much like to live somewhere near Torquay. It’s not too far from the city and the epicenter of surfing culture and beaches.]

That brings us to the “sad epiphany” of this post’s title. I have contacted Australian Immigration and spoke with someone on the phone. It looks like I have some hard choices to make if I want to move here. It will take at least 2 – 3 years after I graduate from New Paltz before I can move here. Then based on the cureent system, I will have to find an employer to sponsor me after having worked for 3 years. So it will take at least five years before I can move here; unless the system changes by the time I graduate.

"Three cubic feet of blood and bone": Academic, Apple fanatic, and forever 18.

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