Paris is wonderful. There’s no words. I’m starting to think i should do a semester in Paris during grad school. It’s quite close to perfect.

It takes a whole day to get there. literally. I took a bus, a train, a bus, a plane, and a bus to get to the outskirts of paris. Then i had to try and find a subway in a language i know nothing about. But the parisian people are very accomodating if you’re polite. So i managed to meet my friend Naomi under the eiffel tower at 11 at night (mind you i left urbino at 7 in the morning).

The rest of the trip was great and everything went according to plan.
here’s the list of things i did:

Went to the louvre twice
Went to the orsay once
Went to the top of the eiffel tower and tagged it with me and my boyfriend’s names.
Went to the arc de triomphe and therefore the champs elysees (??) and the latter was highly overrated.
Went to all of ernest hemingway’s hangouts and bought books at the Original Shakespeare and Co twice.
took a boat tour down the seine
Ate creme brulee (??)
Ate baguettes and cheese everyday
Ate a chocolately french pastry
Drank a french specialty: beer and lemonade
Drank french wine and coffee
Ate sushi, which i can’t get in urbino
and finally, ordered a royale with cheese at mcdonalds.

Not bad for 4 days.

I have to confess i’ve been back in urbino for a bit, but forgot to update when i came back, since i had so much to catch up on, as far as work and friends, etc. I’m sorry!

It’s hard to make generalizations about italians or italian culture when i’ve only been here for 6 weeks, but i have noticed two extremes. They either hate or love americans.

On the one hand, I can go to clubs and get into the VIP section and have plates of fruit and free bottles of champagne brought over simply because the guy who runs the place loves us/ wants to practice english. (I don’t care either way, because it’s all free anyway.)

On the extreme other end, I try to carry on a conversation at a party and get laughed at and ridiculed for my skills with the language. It’s like they can’t believe that i’m american, female, and have a brain. One of my friends was actually told at a party that she was “butchering the language.” It’s really cruel. And it even happened to me in the middle of explaining that i’ve only been here and short time, and i’m trying to improve my language skills – i got laughed out of the dinner table by a bunch of hateful italian girls.
It really kills your confidence. And i do think it’s because we’re americans, because the other spanish/french/irish/english people here have no problem mingling and being accepted.

You can’t practice if people have no patience to hear you even speak.

That said, i have one more issue with the program:

NOBODY TOLD ME THAT THE DORM CLOSES FOR 10 DAYS!!!

I found out a week or so ago. So now, i’ve got nowhere to go: all of the other europeans go home and the americans all have people visiting. I am without hotel reservations for the busiest week in Italy – Easter. There’s so many tourists that all the hotels raise their prices, and the cheap hostels are all booked up. It looks like i have to pay the equivalent of $100 a night for a hotel, which puts me at A GRAND TOTAL OF $1,000 (that’s without food and transportation, mind you).

Thanks italy. Thanks alot. And thank you University of Urbino, for never telling me any pertinent information that could affect whether i live in a train station for a week or not. Real nice.

Hey Italy, we’re not on speaking terms right now. So please leave me alone, and stop offering me delicious food and wine. it’s not going to work.

eh, maybe it will.

So this week has been a huge work week for me so far. I have been volunteering at Pine Street Creative Arts Center for the last two weeks helping to plan and do some art for the big smARTarts festivel that is coming up soon. The center is really close to my apartment(literally accross the street) and is a great place. They do a lot of promoting to encourage young artists to “fuel there inner fire” and creativity. Monday I went in and was pretty much doing office work all night, data entry etc. I compiled a huge list of all of the art galleries in Sydney with contact information and what not to give to all of the young artists that are showing their work that week. We also have been calling bands and setting up workshops for people to do such as bellydancing and beading workshops along with artist who are doing talks all day. I am really excited to be helping out because it is a great place with amazing people. Wednesday I screenprinted bags all day with the logo to give out during the festival, they came out awesome.

This weekend I am going to a festival on Saturday called V-fest. Its all day in Sydney and it is just a huge line up of bands…Gnarles Barkley, Pixies, Beck, Pet Shop Boys, Groove Armada, Radio Soulwax, 2ManyDJS, Jarvis Cocker, The Rapture and many others. The tickets were 100 dollars, but we looked up tickets for groove armada and gnarles barkley alone and they were around 100 dollars just to see them, so it is really a great deal. So excited for this weekend.

I had another test today. Went extremly well and I pretty sure I did good so we will see. I think we(the gang) also have our plans for break. We are going to go to Melbourne for 10 days and they come back to Sydney and relax for a few before uni starts again. Still loving it here so much, couldn’t have better friends. I actually deciding that I might stay until the end of August and do a roadtrip with 3 others around Australia. Good possibility for that. Well, have to get to some reading.

Lauren

So as Ang has recounted in her blog, yes the three of us had an awesome time! However I fear her sleep deprivation and just usual self professed craziness means she might have gotten our itinerary a little wrong, but I’ll forgive her! ; )

Omar was supposed to arrive 8.25pm on Friday night but because of the snowstorm in NY his flight got delayed and then finally cancelled. Everytime my phone rang that night I feared worse and worse news. So Ang who was due to arrive Sat afternoon ended up arriving before Omar! Then Ang, straight from Stansted airport, and I headed to Heathrow to finally be reunited. As soon as we got on the tube Omar snapped a picture of the three of us and looked at me and said “What? I’m a terrorist!” and then we burst out laughing as we realized he meant to say tourist. It must have been all those hours in the airport getting to him!
The next morning, I regrettfully got them up early as they both probably could have and perhaps should have slept a whole day, but getting up early was the only way we’d get to see all I had planned. We first went to Spitalfields Market, and yes I got a brownie, Cris even called me when he was in the airport back from Spain just to request that I get him a brownie as well! They were impressed with the market and I was glad, although Omar complained about all the pushing and shoving, I suppose I’ve become accustomed to it only because it’s a small area with lots of people and to be expected. We then took the tube to St James’ Park and walked to Buckingham Palace taking all the necessary pictures, then through St. James Park, much windier and colder (They both didn’t believe me that only last week the weather had been warm and nice, like it is today! I think Omar brought the storm with him!) than I remember in September. We passed by the Horse Guards just in time to see the last change of the day, I joked I had timed our walk to coincide with that but Omar knew better!

We met up with Cris and Damon near Big Ben and then embarked on the famous South Bank walk, going up to the Oxo Tower observation deck as we had with Cris’ friend, crossing the Millennium Bridge, before going into St Paul’s briefly and for free since there was a service starting. We then took the tube to Oxford Circus and walked to Leicester Sqaure from there, settling down at Waxy’s Little Sister which was still celebrating St. Patrick’s Day even though it had been the day before. It was a long tiring day but I felt like they had seen the most crucical touristy points of the city. As Cris once said, on your first visit to London, you have to just walk. There’s so much to see that there’s no time to actually pick one thing and explore it, that’s for the next trip, you have to walk around and see everything (famous or not) and just get a feel for it all.

Monday I took Omar and Ang to Camden. They loved the area and the market, I was glad they were feeling the same way about my favourite parts of my adopted city as I do. After grabbing some cheap food (huge container of noodles plus a drink for £3) because it was a weekday and bargaining for a shirt or two, we headed to Trafalgar Sqaure, which I think has slowly embedded itself in my mind as one of my favorite places in London. I think there also might be a logical reason for this too since it’s very central to most things in central london. We stopped off at Cris and Damon’s flat to convince them both to come to my flat for a sort of impromptu dinner, which yes they ended up cooking mainly (we had salad stuffed into pita bread) because I was trying and stressing to find a way Omar and Ang could get to Luton Airport for their 6AM flight since the tube inconveinently closes at night. But everything worked out well and they got their flight, though Omar’s absence meaning I had to read as much of Trainspotting for my postmodern class on Monday as I could since he was leaving on Sunday. The first 50 or so pages of Trainspotting were really difficult to read because of the Scottish dialect but after awhile I was breezing through it.

Thursday I ran into Petros on Trent Park campus after my class (we had read Alice Walker’s short stories entitled “You Can’t Keep A Good Woman Down”, very good) and various tutorials, and traveled back to Enfield campus with him, running into Raggy and then finally picking up Omar from the train station. It was decided that we would all meet later in Raggy’s flat before going out. So Omar and I went back to my flat and got ready for the night out, I was a little disappointed that Omar, Ang and I didn’t get to go out to a club or something one night while they were both here but it was a tight schedule in the first place and Omar’s delay didn’t help much!

So Omar, Petros and I went over to Raggy’s flat and was joined by Maggie. Eventually after much chatting and relaxed drinking we said goodbye to Maggie, convinced Raggy to come out with us and headed off to Tottenham Court Rd. We went to a club called The Ghetto and by showing your student ID you could get in for only £1! They played good music towards the end, like around 2.30AM but by that point we were all really tired and decided to head home. The night bus seemed less choatic on a Thursday night than a Friday or Sat.

Friday was as usual £1 Carling night at the forum or “Fun Friday” as Damon jokingly calls it. I really wanted to take Omar to the Forum that night and stay there the whole time instead of going out just so he would first get to meet all my friends but to also get a feel for the dynamic that the group has especially on Friday night at the forum. Afterwards we headed to Will and Maggie’s kitchen for an impromptu gathering and then Omar and I stayed up with Cris and Damon until around 4am so they could get the first morning bus home.

Saturday night (notice I’m recounting all in “nights” now, that’s because having all the touristy things done, it was now time for Omar to catch a glimpse of nightly student life in London), we went to our beloved Underworld for indie night. Omar met up with a friend he knows from NP who’s studying at Kingston and Cris, Damon, Petros and I enjoyed the likes of Bloc Party and Kaiser Chiefs. Luckily Omar had kept his eye on the time. His flight left at 10:15AM Sunday morning so we worked it out that we were going to leave the club at a certain time. However we didn’t realize that we would loose an hour that night for daylight savings time! Omar’s “global” phone had switched to the now “real” time and we left immediately. We picked up his stuff from the strategically located Cris and Damon’s flat and then Cris, Omar and I set off to Heathrow at 4AM. We had to take two buses and even though the Piccadilly line seemingly takes forever to get to Heathrow, it’s more so with the bus! But we got Omar there on time, in fact with enough time to grab a sandwich for “breakfast”. Said goodbye to Omar in a sort of sleep dazed (I had fallen asleep briefly on the bus while Omar and Cris conversed in Spanish and occasional English) state and then Cris and I jumped on the tube falling asleep from Hatton Cross to Hyde Park Corner, briefly waking up then falling asleep from Green Park to Arnos Grove. We got back at around 11AM.

That “morning” when I woke up at 5PM after a confused call from my Mom as to why I was still sleeping, I focused on reading some H.G.Wells which I’m writing about for my proposition module. I’ve already read The Time Machine and The Invisible Man.
Today I’m missing a Literary Festival on Trent Park because I have an essay due next Monday that I’m working on as well as a killer cold that ’s working on me. My whole head feels congested, though it’s probably a result of being out in the cold weather last week and having a messed up sleep schedule that same week, but it was all worth it. And I’m now on my way to book tickets to visit Ang in Oviedo!

So my internet hasn’t really been working for the last two weeks, hence the lack of blogging.

Had my first exam in one of my classes, got a 34 out of 40 which is a DISTINCTION, which was really high. Only about 20-30 percentt in all of the classes got that or higher, so I am definitely proud of myself. I recently applied to get a volunteer job at a Community Arts center and I got it. Right now we are planning for a Multicultural Arts Festival that happens at the end of April, which I am so excited about. I get to paint and do some screenprinting right now for the t-shirts and bags that will be given away throughout that day.

I also have applied to work at Vogue Fashion Week which is happening the last week in April through the first week in May. I applied to get a job dressing the models. Crazy right! It is also volunteer, but I figured it would look extremely good on my resume and would be so much fun and different. The weekend was filled with Iraq War peace rallies at town hall and a huge bridge celebration over the weekend to celebrate the Harbour Bridges’ 70th anniversary. The bridge was closed down all day Sunday and people walked across it all day. In the evening there were fireworks, music and vendors all down by the rocks. It was really great. The week went by pretty slow but a lot of things were coming up later in the week and over the weekend.

Ricky had a birthday on the 20th and turned 24. The girls and I went out and got a cake and decorations and when he went upstairs to nap at 930pm we decorated and baked. At 12 we ran upstairs with everyone and woke him up and then took him out. We drank some wine before we went out and eventually made it to Broadway Bar where it was dead because it was a Monday night at 12. Heleen ended up going home and a bunch of us went up to Oxford street around 2 and everything there was closing. Ricky and I ended up being the only ones who stayed out wandering around Sydney and ended up gettin home at 630am the next day. So much fun. Glad I did not have class that day!!
On Friday I had a presentation also in my sociology class on cultural capital and how it affects parental involvement in the classroom, in which I got a High Distinction on (extremely happy about that!!!) Then right from that class I went to Newcastle with my friends Heleen–Matt and Zach. We took the train which was about three hours north to the northern beaches which are absolutely amazing! Arrived and walked to our first hostel which had a pool and was set in these 2 very old victorian style houses and we went out to dinner. Had great pesto pasta and then headed out to a bar called The Brewery. It was nice, 3 floors good djs and live bands and a good atmosphere. We heard about a foam party at another bar and went to check it out, but by the time we got there all the foam was all over and everyone was going home. Got back to the hostel and went swimming then went to bed…late again!

The next morning we woke up early, Zack and Matt went home and Heleen and I stayed to do the “tourist stuff”. We went to Blackbutt Reserve and walked around this gorgeous jungle like atmosphere and saw koalas — walabies — kangaroos and lots of birds. It was so gorgeous outside and the perfect day to go hiking. When we got back into town we were so starving. We went down a street we had heard had really nice outside cafes and went and sat down in one. We ended up having the best meal so far, since we have been here and sat for about 3 hours. We split a spinach salad with sweet potato, feta, kalamata olives, sundried tomatoes and a balsamic dressing along with Penne in a light creme fraise sauce with candied walnuts, chicken, bacon, and onion. SOOOO DELICIOIUS, not to mention we had a beautiful glass of wine and sat outside underneath tiki umbrellas and palm trees in a small terrace like garden. AMAZING. Went back to the hostel had an early night and prepared for the next day.

We woke up early and it was sort of raining and we decided to go see if we could get to the vinyards. The information booth told us we had already missed all of the tours, but we still decided to try to figure out how to get there on our own. We took a train as close as we could and on the train all we saw was farmland–cows –horses and poverty. It was a huge eye opener for us because all we had been seeing were the wealthy neighborhoods of Sydney. We later found out that most of the people who live there are live on government money because they are unemployed or have large families, sort of like our welfare system and all of the housing is free housing. It was good that I saw it because it was interesting that right out of the city there are places like this. We got as close as we could to the vinyards and started walking, walking walking—in farm country open space horses mountains everything you name it. We learned before we left the last bus back to the station left at 3:55 so we walked as far as we could saw one vineyard, took some pictures and went home. Oh well at least it was a good walk!! All and all it was a great great weekend and fun times again with my traveling buddies!!

Pictures

Vineyards at Hunter Valley
Koalas at Blackbutt Reserve
The house decorated

Well I don’t have too much time to update, litterature class is in 20 minutes. But I at least want to finish up about my wonderful vacation.

The last part of our day in Nice was spent shopping and sitting in the hotel lobby since it started to rain and we were pretty exhausted anyway. We headed to the train station early and when we boarded, the entire train was completely empty. It was the weirdest feeling. Eventually two people got on and then a few more at other stops but it was still not a lot of people. There were two guys in front of us though who we heard speaking English who were also going to Barcelona and they ended up helping us out a lot since our tickets were a little messed up. But we made it into Spain and transferred trains. It was perfect timing too because the first part of our ride was along the sea and it just so happened that the sun was rising just as we were going by. It was probablmy one of the most gorgeous sights I’ve seen.

We eventually got into Barcelona and realized that someone (not me) had forgotten to bring the address of our hostel. The guys we met on the train pointed us in the general direction of where it might be and we parted ways. So we wandered around the streets for a little while and we found our biggest challenge….no one in Spain speaks English. I guess in some parts they do but in Barcelona there is such a strong sense of regional heritage that the second language for everyone is Catalan. Interesting though a little unfortunate for us. Luckily we found an internet cafe and were able to get the address of our hostel which ended up not being too far from where we were.

By the time we had settled in and were ready to head out again; it was raining. We had been planning on wondering a bit but instead decided to find some Museums. We ended up at the History of the City Museum as it was the cheapest but it turned out to be really interesting. The entire basement was a reconstruction of the city in roman times built with real ruins.

It was still raining when we left and it continued through most of the night so we stayed at the hostel which we thought would be boring but wasn’t at all. It was amazing to meet so many people. In our room there were two sisters from Slovakia and a German guy who all spoke English. We went out into the common area and played cards and met some other people like this group of guys from England who I actually understood less than the people who spoke English as a second language.

Day two was gorgeous so we decided to do our outdoor things. I had really wanted to go to the Park Guell which was designed by Gaudi as his Utopia so we went there first. It was gorgeous. It’s on a hill overlooking the city and there are tons of palm trees and huge plants. I dopn’t even know how to describe it. Almost everything is done in ceramic mosaic tiling. If you’ve never seen it it is necessary that you do a google image search right now even though it’s nothing compared to what it’s like in real life.

The rest of the day was spent exploring the Sagrada Familia which is a gorgeous church (another thing by Gaudi) that was started 1882 and is still being worked on today. It was weird to get there and have it still be under construction. It was so beautiful though. It looked like a drip sand castle and had tons of sculptures and stuff. There was a lot of symbolism and such in the design and it was all explained in the basement museum area but none of the signs were in English or French so we had to try to read them in Spanish which kind of worked some of the time. It was still good fun though.

That night we cooked dinner in the hostel and walked down to the Marina and looked at boats and the water. It was interesting to do but not so much to talk about so I’ll just skip over to lunch the next day. We decided that if we were in Spain it was necessary that we eat the traditional food, paella. We found a restaurant that had it and went in. The traditional version is mixted seafood which I chickened out and didn’t get though my friend did. When it came though, there were prawns on it. Full prawns. Like eyes and antanes and legs prawns. I was happy with ,y vegetable one but it was still good fun to watch my friend struggle to get the meat out making a huge mess in the process. 

After that was the beach. It had been warmer earlier in the day but by the time we got there it was windy and kind of cold. I stood in the water and laid on the beach and played in the sand. But now it’s time for me to go. So let me just quickly say that we left and took another long train ride (12 hours) and arrived home at 5:30 the next morning. Exhausting but an unforgettable experience without a doubt!

So school is a bit more work then I thought it was going to be. One of the professors actually asked me if my brain was on overload from the classes that I am taking. Sociology—psychology—and philosophy. Too much thinking! There aren’t any actual assignments really but tons and tons of wordy reading…Metacognition…hmmm sounds interesting. HA!

Heleen, Matt, and I are taking a trip up to Newcastle next weekend. It is about 3 hours north on the train. Northern beaches from what we have heard from almost everyone including Matt are supposed to be absolutely amazing. We are planning to go to Hunter Valley as well, which is wine country central!!! Then we are planning to hop on over to Gunnedah which is a huge park in the middle of no where—and KOALA CAPITAL OF THE WORLD!!! I really need to see my first koala and kangaroo already. I am a little jealous because my sister has already.

Spring break plans are also rolling along. First idea was Melbourne—Tasmania—then Adelaide. Now…its looking like I will be joining my sister and her lovely Canadian friends and going to Fraser Island. It is an entire island made up of only sand. There are no paved roads so you have to do everything in a “4WD”. You can either rent them or use your own if you have one. Hopefully these plans work out. At the end of our semester we plan on then doing the first original trip, then going to Alice Springs and Cairns to see the Great Barrier Reef!!! I really can’t wait for that!!

We finally got a membership at Blockbuster as well so we are renting movies like feens and watching them—so far American Beauty, Little Miss Sunshine, Amelie, and You Me and Dupree. I really am so happy that I am friends with flat 4…they are all so so much fun!! This week is Ricky’s birthday from Canada, so the plans are getting up really early decorating the living room, baking him a cake, taking him to dinner, and we are all pitching in to buy him tickets to see the Pixies when they come to Sydney. Matt and I are also going to “V Fest” which is the last big Festival in Sydney—Gnarles Barkley, The Pixies, Groove Armada, Pheonix, Pet Shop Boys and The Rapture. I am soo excited for that!! I can’t wait to see Gnarles Barkley again….they are so great to see live!!

Well this week went nice and mellow, went out a few times, trying to budget my “going out money” but the one bar we go to Broadway Bar, the bartenders know Heleen, Matt and I now because we go there so much. Its funny because the one guy is from London and he moved here because bartenders here get paid about 25 dollars an hour plus tips!! Yeah and I thought I made a lot of money bartending!! HA! Well it is early here and I am tired so I will be getting back to sleep.

Hope everyone is handling the snow fine!! Have fun…enjoy it!!

Lauren

I figured I’d give just a quick little update before Omar and Ang arrive because I’m sure I’ll have another crazy time like last weekend and won’t have much time to take a breather let alone write a blog. Friday I went into Central and ended up trashing my plans to go to the National Gallery and just walked around instead because it was another nice day out (the weather seems to be getting nicer and more spring-like), though it did rain heavily at one point as I was crossing Hungerford Bridge. For some reason I really like the area of and around Trafalgar Square, it’s near all the bookshops on Charing Cross Rd and near enough other attractions like Parliament, Piccadilly and Leicester Square. Perhaps I was also inadvertantly checking out where I want to take my friends when they get here. I went home sort of early to prepare for a night at the Forum with friends and £1 pints. As usual our table started with just a few and by the end of the night we were what made up most of the Forum. It was followed by the now customary breakfast at lunchtime at the cafe on the High St the next morning.

Later that day I met up with Cris and Manu near St. Paul’s. We went to visit Manu’s uncle who works at Merrill Lynch and he showed us around. Since it was at night it was quiet but it must be crazy during the day. There were tons of desks for at least 100 people or so, each had 4 or up to 8(!) computer screens and of course phones. Manu’s uncle has headphones that he wears when he wants to block out the noise. The boys then wanted to watch Barcelona vs. Real Madrid and so we found a pub near Leicester Square and I braced myself to watch my first full football match. Manu told me that the guys in the white (Real Madrid) were the good guys and to cheer for them, however I wasn’t needed. As it turned out the guy sitting at the table next to us was Spanish and also rooting for Madrid. Whenever they scored a goal the three Spainards in the room made more noise than the 20 or so English who were half-heartedly watching the game. In fact the DJ (?yes there was a DJ in the pub for some reason) turned down the music after the first goal and said something like “You’re Spanish, huh?”

We left the pub (I don’t remember the score, shows how much I was paying attention!) and headed to Camden to finally return to our beloved Barfly for our much needed indie night. When we arrived there was a band called We Are The Physics setting up, we were a little let down but then 5 of our friends showed up. After the band, they put DJs on who were alright but I keep coming the conclusion that Damon and Cris should somehow throw an indie night at their flat with Damon DJ-ing! At least then no one would lose their wallet in Camden, have someone almost get into a fight with them over a kebab and we wouldn’t have to continuously keep an eye on someone who has a tendency to wander and then forget his jacket at the club! But I guess that’s part of the fun of going out in Camden!

As if our ears hadn’t taken enough damage for one weekend on Sunday, Cris and I went to see Nine Inch Nails at Carling Academy at Brixton (I was disappointed, a pint of Carling was pretty expensive!). Cris had got tickets, he’s not really a fan of them but had gone to Camden that day and came back wearing a NIN shirt so at least he got into the spirit of things. I think he enjoyed it (I hope!). It was great to finally see them live but as I said to Cris, now I’m that much closer to dying. He had asked me awhile ago what bands haven’t I seen yet. I said “Before I die I have to see NIN and Radiohead”. I think we’re going to hold out on Radiohead for awhile!

Monday was beautiful and springlike on Trent Park. The daffodils on campus were blooming. Our tutor turned up and said she couldn’t find her lecture notes and was going to drive home to look for them, she gave us questions to do in the meantime and me and my two classmates decided to do our questions outside. After having a coffee and talking first, we finally got down to work in the warm sun. Yesterday I began reading for next Monday, I want to have all my work finished by the time Omar and Ang get here. Cris has a few days off for “reading week” which I don’t quite understand since he’s doing graphic design and I’m the one with all the reading, but he went back to Spain for a few days. So everyone is practically in transit right now. I’ve got one gone to Spain, one on his way from New York, one on her way from Spain! By Sunday afternoon we’ll all be in one place, and that will be miraculous!

PICTURES.

1. All street crossings have “look right” “look left” painted before pedestrians cross the street, I am assuming so tourists (like me) don’t get run over!

2. Sydney Opera House

3. Harbour Bridge at Sunset

4. Bondi Beach-most famous beach in Sydney
5. Chinese Botanical Gardens

6. Chinese New Year

7. Mardi Gras Dress Up

8./9./10. The view down from the highest point in Royal National Park, our food for 2 days, the girls and I exhausted

11./12. Kaitlin–Heleen–Matt, Marcus–I

13./14. Maire—Dagmar(made shirts to find flats), Ricky from Toronto

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11/12

13/14

Here in Italy, Friday was Festa Della Donna, or Women’s day. What this means is women walk down the street and men are obliged to say “tanti auguri” (best wishes) and give us flowers. They had traditional italian dancers in the piazza all night, dancing to folk music. We got some drinks and hung out in the piazza with the german girls in our program.

On Saturday, I went to Bologna with two friends to go shopping at the outdoor market. It didn’t live up to my expectations, but i found some good deals. My best purchase was a few silk scarves for a euro each. After that we ate at a chinese restaurant, which I was dying to check out since i haven’t eaten it in a while – it was fantastic. (Here’s the thing about Italy – their food is so good that they don’t have to have great international cuisine.) I have a serious lack of sushi in my life because i haven’t seen a japanese restaurant in all of my travels. There is a chinese restaurant in Urbino, but a few friends advised me never to go, since they all ended up with food poisoning one night.
After eating, we found H&M and Pull and Bear and did some shopping for clothes. We also found a little pastry shop, where i bought something that had chocolate and coffee beans, which in the language of italian-pastry translates to delicious.
I’m also registering for classes this week, which is a huge production, since the courses don’t quite transfer exactly. It boils down to me not having enough credits to be a full time student. But i’m not going to bore you with the details…

Needless to say, with all of this action going on, i need a vacation from my italian vacation…

…So i’m going to PARIS!

I leave on wednesday and will return monday morning, so no blog updates until afterward. I’m also meeting an american friend there! My plans for paris include:

• going to the louvre every day with my friend, so she can educate my ignorant self in art.
• bringing A Moveable Feast and relaxing in a park somewhere with a coffee
• going to McDonald’s and ordering the “Royale with cheese” because, yes, i’m that nerdy.
• visiting the eiffel tower – what kind of american tourist would i be if i didn’t?
• Maybe Notre Dame? Tour of the Seine? Who knows?

If there’s any sort of Hemingway tour, i’ll be on it in a second. I’m super-excited. I got one of my friends here to teach me a few french phrases, so i’ll be set with the how-do-you-do’s
Wish me luck!

I can honestly say this has been one of the most incredible weekends in Australia so far. This weekend Heleen, Ewa and I decided to do a 2 day camping trip in Royal National Park. This is one of the most diverse resources around Sydney. I was soon to be shown that you can have 5 different landscapes packed in one area.

The trip started on Saturday morning, taking the train south to Cronulla and then taking a ferry over to Bundeena where the park started. While in Cronulla we got food for our trip. This consisted of bread, cheese, cucumbers, olives, grapes, a bottle of red wine and lots of water. We then got a mosquito net, candles, rope, a lighter and we were set for this adventure!
The ferry ride over to Bundeena was magical. It was like we were in another place. The water was the clearest and bluest I have ever seen in my entire life. In the middle of the ferry ride and we could still see straight down to the bottom of the water. It was a gorgeous day out, 70’s and a few clouds in the sky, it was perfect to start off our hike.

When we arrived in Buneena we got a map and decided to do the 30km Coastal Walk—it included beaches, dramatic cliffs, sandstone cliffs,a palm jungle, swimming holes, lagoons, great vegetation and animal life. We started walking and the first thing we saw were these huge stunning cliffs with drops that are unexplainable. The water down below looked soincredibly powerful. Each time a wave slammed into the rocks it made this immense thundering noise. As we kept walking we discovered these red rocks off to the side of the track. We went over and thought what we were going to be walking on was sand because it looked so flat and smooth (like it had just been blown over with wind), but to our surprise it was in fact smooth sandstone. It was such a tease to our eyes everytime we looked at it, it seemed as though it was this mini desert. These red rocks were all over it too. We could not figure out what they were or how they got there or why they looked like they had dyed some of the rocks. It was so interesting we decided that we would look it up when we got back.
The next thing was this huge beach with a miniature desert and lagoon set in the back of it. It was a perfect spot to do a little sea-shell hunting and have a bite to eat. The waves here were so big and powerful that no one was swimming, and there were signs posted everywhere about it being an unpatrolled beach. As I was sitting on the beach, I kept thinking to myself how lucky I am to be in this place, because it really is so wonderful here. Our trip continued around to Wattamolla where we decided there to camp out on the beach. We set up our mosquito net, hung our food off a tree in the distance (just in case), opened the bottle of wine and laid out under the stars. Since living in Sydney I was convinced the stars were not as bright here and there weren’t as many (haha), this night they were amazing. The moon was so bright and we could see everything. In the middle of the night it was so cold we all wished we hadn’t camped or had brought more clothing but, it was all worth it when the sun came up over the cliffs and warmed us up at 7am and got us ready for the next day of our adventure.

We started the morning walking again on the coastal track heading on our way to Garie Beach. This was a cute little surfing beach tucked back in the middle of no where. We were all so hot and tired at that point we decided to go sit for an hour (it was about 75-78 degrees) and have a burger and oh that hit the spot!! Oh yeah and on a side note they put a beet root on all of the burgers here. After a great little rest we were off again. This time to see some jungle. The second half of the hike was so intense. Pretty much it was up one side of a mountain down the other, for about 4 mountains.

We arrived finally at this place called burning palms and it was like a small rainforest tucked in the middle of all of the cliffs. We kept walking through and over and around these huge palm trees and ferns, and for once we were actually cool and in the shade! It was so amazing to me because I have never been to a real jungle and this was pretty close to it. After we got out of the jungle we hiked straight up (no joke—my legs are hating me for it right now). We hiked up and up and up and then—it was all worth it. The view. It was the best view I have ever seen in my entire life so far. We were out on this small ledge looking down at this tiny beach and there was just forest everywhere, not to mention we could see all of the small mountains we had climbed before. It took my breath away just long enough to re-coop and get going on to the end so we could make it out and catch the train back to Sydney. As we walked out of the park the three of us looked at eachother and said “I can’t believe we did it!” It was such a wonderful experience and a great time had by all. I really want to go back and hike the opposite end first and loop the other way around, but who knows.

I promise to post pictures soon…I am having some trouble uploading because of the file size. Talk to everyone soon.