We arrived, exhausted, back in Sydney on Sunday evening from New Zealand to another busy week! Although I was tired, I had slept the entire flight home and knew I wasn’t going to be able to get to sleep again. Instead, I hung out with Tommy, Kevin, Ian, and Allie hearing all about their exciting weekend and telling them about New Zealand. The majority of our group had gone on a wine tour on Saturday and attended an Australian Rules Football game on Sunday. We also made a tentative schedule for the next 2 weeks in Sydney. There is so much to do in this city and we wanted to make sure we could squeeze everything in!
Sarah and I had decided we both wanted to sleep in on Monday morning before heading to the library to upload photos (5 albums on Facebook!) and update our blogs. I had purchased 2 liters of duty free Tequila from the Auckland International Airport to take to a BYO Mexican restaurant on Monday night. We all wanted to go out to celebrate the sale of my house (always SOMETHING to celebrate!) so we decided to go for Mexican and margaritas. Remember how I said the Mexican restaurant wasn’t too bad? We must have struck it lucky because it was HORRIBLE on Monday night!! Although the food wasn’t very good, we still had a good time drinking margaritas and getting in some laughs. We got from dinner and had another internet party out at our typically picnic table. I was finally tired and was able to get to sleep relatively early.
On Tuesday, our class had been moved to the morning. We had an afternoon “field trip” with Pete to The Rocks. We went on a walking tour/lecture to visualize how Sydney looked when the British landed and started building the colony. It was actually really interesting because we had a packet of drawings that showed how it look that you could really tell was the same place we were standing but hundreds of years earlier. The Rocks is famous for having the oldest pubs and hotels in Sydney since that was some of the earliest businesses opened. Our lecture ended right outside the oldest hotel in Sydney, which conveniently also brews its own beer. After grabbing a few beers, we decided to walk to another hotel in The Rocks famous for its gourmet pizza. We ordered a couple pizzas: Kangaroo, Emu, Crocodile, Duck! It was actually the best pizza I’ve had in Australia! The Rocks has several neat and different pubs that we planned on visiting during a mini pub crawl. However, the weather didn’t cooperate and so we decided we would hold off for a better night. Instead, we grabbed Starbucks (Heaven in a Cup!!) and headed back to the dorms to watch a movie.
We woke up Wednesday morning, grabbed a quick breakfast, and headed to the library (are you catching the daily pattern!?). We had a few things to sort out before we left for Melbourne (rental car for Great Ocean Road and possible wine tour). I also needed to get check out a few books to start my research for my sports paper (Oh yea, I’m here for school….). After class, we all rounded up and headed back to Coogee Beach to eat at the $2 steak place. For only $8, you can get a beer, steak, fries, and salad. Considering we are all starving students, this is a really good deal! The plan was to just hang out after dinner, drinking beer and playing pool. We ended up having a little excitement instead… An Aussie guy that was playing pool with our group offered to guy one of the girls and one of the guys in our group a beer. Not thinking anything of it, they accepted. The Aussie ended up spiking one of the drinks (unbeknown to us) and tried offering that one to the girl in our group. A series of events happened, the guy in our group took that beer instead, and a night full of commotion began. Without going into detail, I got back from the ER with the guy in our group and one of our program coordinators around 4AM. It was really scary and a lesson we could have all gone without learning first hand. We were told numerous times to not accept drinks, but none of us thought anything of it. It makes me fortunate that we have an amazing group and we all look out for each other when we go out. Take it from me: be careful when accepting drinks at the bar!!
I’m currently (it’s Thursday, July 9) sitting at the Sydney International Airport waiting on my flight to Melbourne, Australia. Jo, Sarah, and I are flying down together and meeting 2 other people for a 4 day weekend. We have a fun weekend full of shopping, wine, and the Great Ocean Road ahead of us! Update soon!
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