Papers...Papers...Papers...

Crunch time is finally hitting me academically in paradise!  With only two weeks left of school, including final exams, I have been overwhelmed by the workload this past week.  In total, I have written and turned in about 12,000 words of papers this week alone.  My diet has definitely suffered going from three solid meals a day, to breakfast, maybe lunch, heaps of starbursts, energy drinks, vitamin waters, and cereal.  My teeth hate me right now, but it's the only way to stay focused and alive during crunch time.  

Wednesday was the final event for res wars and we had it in the bag... or so we thought.  All we needed to do was finish in the top two to guarantee ourselves of the overall title, but in our final game, after leading 1-0 at half, the defense fell apart and we lost 3-1.  We eventually finished third on the night, and tied for fist overall.  I guess it is nice to finish in first, but an undisputed first would have been nice.  Oh well.

Thursday was another work day, but I got out a bit at night for my friend James' bowling project for his business class.  We played two games and I took first place in each game so I was happy with the results from the night.

Today I had class, but after that, I went to play lawn bowls with my Aussie Sports class.  Lawn bowls is similar to bocce, but the balls are weighted to one side, so the ball will curve when rolled.  We headed to Mermaid Beach Bowls Club, took our shoes off, and had a few beers.  The grass the lanes are comprised of was like walking on a neatly trimmed carpet, similar to a golf green, but even tighter cut and more densely seeded.  Lawn bowls is actually a sport mainly played by people over the age of 50, but it is a lot tougher than it seems.  I had a difficult time judging the speed of the green, and basically scored 1 point the entire time there.  There were about 15 of us playing and we all had fun, so the day was a success.

Tonight (friday night) a few of us were supposed to go see Slumdog Millionaire, but heavy rains deterred us from walking to the bus stop.  We will probably see it Sunday, however.

Tomorrow I was asked to play in a 3-0n-3 basketball tournament and we begin playing at 9 am. It is probably a good thing we didn't head to the movie because I'm going to need a good night sleep to get my body ready for such an early contest.  Tomorrow night is also Christian's birthday so I am sure it will be a late night.

That's it for tonight.  I am exhausted from the week, but gearing up for what looks to be a fun weekend.  

Goodnight from Paradise!

video

Life has been crazy, but here is the video of me bungee jumping.  I'll post what has happened this week later today, but for now, here is the video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVyUMGOLX2o

A week later...

So it has been a week since I have blogged, and a bunch has happened since.  The week began with a bang Tuesday night when Christian and I went BUNGEE JUMPING!  I kind of kept it low key so nobody (my mother) would get nervous, or try and talk me out of it.  We headed into Surfers Paradise and jumped from 43 meters (about 140 feet).  The feeling was incredible!  the moment we reached the top of the crane, I looked out, and had a quick second though blitz through my mind.  Once I collected my thoughts, I waddled (because I was strapped by my feet) to the edge, and got mentally ready to jump off.  The feeling I got before I jumped was unlike anything I have ever felt before.  It was different from skydiving  because I had to jump out myself.  A few seconds later, I got my nerves together and leaped off the ledge.  The fall was about 2.5 seconds, but seemed like forever.  The cord obviously held up and I have lived through another crazy experience, but there will be another on before I leave the southern hemisphere.  

Wednesday brought Res Wars per usual, bowling edition this time.  We headed into Surfers to Strike Bowling, had a few beers, played a string (is that what you call it?) of bowling, and then played pool and ate the kitchen clean.  I was bowling pretty well until a few lack of concentration open frames derailed my chance at getting the overall high score.  I ended with a 139, and my teammate rolled a 168.  We thought we had the best team total, but were overtaken by a few pins at the end.  The loss hurt for a second, but we maintained our overall lead.  This week coming up is the last activity for Res Wars.  The event is indoor soccer, and we should dominate that.

Thursday and Friday were boring school days, but on Friday night, a few friends and I headed in to Brisbane to watch a National Rugby League football match between Brisbane and Melbourne.  The stadium was really nice, and located right in the CBD (central business district).  It was an early season game and wasn't sold out, but the announced attendance was in the neighborhood of 40,000.  The game was really fun to watch, but because I don't completely know the rules, I was a bit lost.  My friend Anne described it best.  She said, " It is like going to class without doing homework for a month, and then trying to figure out what the professor is saying, without making it obvious you have no clue."  Brisbane eventually won the game 16-14.

Yesterday I had my final club soccer game, which we won 5-1.  It was nice to dominate a team for beginning to end, but sad to know our team's potential wasn't reached during the season.  We ended up missing the playoffs by one win.  Later that night, I headed to Surfers again with Jorge, Jim, Pat, and a few of Jorge's friends to watch Jorge bungee, and to have dinner.  We found a hole-in-the-wall Thai restaurant that was fantastic, and enjoyed hanging out off campus.  Today I was supposed to head to the beach to do some serious skim boarding, but the wind was too strong to make it worthwhile.  Now it is about 7 p.m., and I guess it's time to do some homework.

Only three more weeks of school for me, and then it's time to travel!  Yikes!

Goodnight from Paradise!

lazy sunday

Today is just one of those days I don't want to get out of bed.  Things are great and the weather is beautiful(nothing new) but my bed/room are just fine today.  We ended up winning Res Wars the other night.  My ankle held up until the very last minute of the championship game when i twisted it and hobbled off the court.  We won by 1 point, and I would have been extremely disappointed if we lost in the minute I left the game.  Once again I was robbed of the player of the night.  The referees actually chose me as the best performer, but somehow they were overruled, and one of my teammates won the award.  Once again, no big deal, but it would be nice to win it one of these days.

Thursday night brought Mardi Gras to Bond Uni.  Mardi Gras here is not what it is like in New Orleans I don't think.  Here, because it is illegal to have homosexual marriages, it is a gay pride festivity.  Everybody dressed up "gay" (which was actually pretty funny, but degrading at the same time) and had a crazy night.

Friday was Friday the 13th here in Australia and we thought we would be cool and watch scary movies.  The only problem with that was my friend who rented the movie rented the special features disk instead of the actual picture.  It took us a few minutes to figure this out, but once we had, the library was closed and we were out of luck.  Oh well.  We tried right.

Yesterday was a fun packed day.  I had a soccer game (we lost because our goalie is awful), went skim boarding for a few hours, and then went to see Gran Torino.  Clint Eastwood never ceases to amaze me with his acting and direction of motion pictures.  It was a really tough movie to watch, but worth the two hours needed to consume it.

That's it for now.  Not sure what the rest of the day holds, but for now, relaxing and doing some work are the only things on the table.  

Shark!!

So I woke up on Friday morning ready to dive.  Well not really because I was extremely tired, but you know what I mean...  After finding no food left when I got up to the mess hall, I got really excited when I saw we were at the outer reef, and people were getting ready to dive.  Just a side note, the area of the reef we were at has only been visited by about 150 documented people ever! Boats hardly ever come out as far as we were, so it was extra exciting to have my first dive of the trip at such and exclusive, far out destination.  I finally got in the water around 8:30 and it was amazing.  The water was surprisingly warm for being 80 kilometers from land but from the surface, not very clear.  Once we sunk beneath the surface however, vision was about 20 meters through our goggles.  We dove to about 8 meters and saw some amazing sights.  Because it was only an introductory dive, we only stayed underwater for about 20 minutes, but were able to get a feel for the tanks, sights, and breathing underwater.  It was such an amazing feeling.  I have dived before, but this was totally different.

After I found myself back on the boat, the crew asked around to see who wanted to do a second, more in-depth dive.  I obviously jumped at the chance to go again, and felt $60 Australian (parents' money) was a steal to dive deeper and longer, and I was right.  The second dive ended up being 50 minutes underwater at around 12 meters deep.  There was a distinct difference in sea-life at that depth, but once again, not describable in words.  I did however have an encounter with a black tip reef shark.  Now before you get all worried and think I am crazy, which I have never disputed, the shark was only about a meter and a half, and scattered once it got to about 5 meters away from us.  HAHA.  I didn't quite get scared, but it was definitely unsettling to know I had no escape if the little guy was hungry.  It was an amazing site to see the shark appear out of the shadows and into vision so quickly.  it is something I will never forget.

That night everybody on the boat was ready to party because it was our last night on-board, but mother nature had a different idea.  That cyclone I mentioned in the last blog started to make havoc on the surf, and was kicking 2-3 meter swells.  The night was rocky to say the least. I didn't, but people got sick.  I'll leave it at that.

Saturday we tried to snorkel before heading back to shore, but the coming cyclone had kicked up a lot of debris and visibility was tough.  Instead, more Uno and poker was our entertainment, and a lasagna lunch filled us up until land.  Once back, the rain had already started.  One of the people on the trip gave us a ride back to town in his motor-home and we found our way to Beaches Backpackers Hostel.  I was surprised how nice it was, and was grateful for it's central location in the town, but more importantly, the sturdy foundation it rested on.  I was able to take my first real shower in four days, but that was a challenge because every time I closed my eyes or bent down to pick a bottle of soap up, I almost fell because my body was used to the rocking of the ocean.  I managed to keep my balance but was ready for a nap.  That night, we had arranged to meet up at the bar just outside our room with some of the people on the trip.  Once we arrived, we saw our boat had it's own reserved table, and for every 4th person who showed up, a free jug of beer.  We ate dinner with almost everybody from the ship, and then partied the night away, partly reminiscing our time on the boat (just hours ago), and partly because we were on solid ground.  The cyclone whipped wind gusts probably in the 80-90 kilometer range with sideways rain, but we were comfortably dry watching from our table.

The night was a bit hairy as the hostel staff came around to room taping the windows up, and giving us a brief of what to do if we were to evacuate, but fortunately nothing big happened. We woke up to a rainy morning, but no cyclone.

Now I am back at school for week 8 of the semester.  With the way my final exams are working out, I will be done with school in week 12!  Yikes!  Things are moving too fast!  I have some things planned for the nest few weeks, but I'll let you know what they are after they come up :)

That's it for now.  Res Wars tonight is basketball and my team needs to win because we have been on a 3 week slide.  I'll try and represent America on the hardwood, but my ankle might not allow it.  

Good afternoon from Paradise!

Back from the Reef...

Finally back from the Great Barrier Reef!  The trip was exhausting, but extremely rewarding.  I left Wednesday morning on a bus/train to Brisbane.  Once there, I jumped on to a plane heading to Prosperpine which is about 35 minutes from Airlie beach (the launching point for the boat).  Once in Airlie, we found our travel agent and confirmed our trip details, and headed to the ship.  The 65 foot catamaran that awaited us was called the Pacific Star.  The ship was built in 1983, but didn't show much wear and tear.  In total, there were 20 passengers and four crew members coming from Oregon, Massachusetts, New Jersey, South Carolina, Rhode Island, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Australia, Austria, South Korea, and England.  There was a mix of ages, but everybody was extremely open and kind.

Our first night, we headed toward the Whitsunday islands.  We were greeted with cheese, crackers, and veggies and a smooth ride into the seemingly endless ocean.  I laid on the deck of the ship for hours just staring at the stars and feeling so small in the scheme of life.  After finally becoming cold for the first time here in Oz, I made my way below deck to sleep.  The almost body sized bed was more comfortable than the hard deck, but for anybody larger than me, it would have been a nightmare.

On Thursday morning, I woke up at 7 am and had some fruit for breakfast, but was welcomed to the day by a just risen sun, crystal clear water, and a sandy cove resting peacefully in the distance.  We were told by our crew that we would have a few hours on the island at Betty's Beach(see second pic).  We gathered our towels and were then tendered to the island on the 12 person dingy attached to the back of the boat.  As we were being brought over, the sight of coral over the edge reminded me I was in a place I have never been before.  Betty's beach is unique in the world because it's sand is made up of 98% silica which is extremely high.  With this amount of silica, the sand was not only almost white, but was extremely cool and fine grained.  Every step I took brought a squeaky-type of noise similar to walking with wet flip-flops on.  Once off the beach and into the water, I was engulfed in saltwater as warm as a bath that had sit for 15 minutes, but somehow refreshing.  After our few hours were finished on the island we headed out for our first real reef experience. 

After about 3 hours of sailing, we reached Bait Reef.  The certified divers went off first so we had some time to snorkel around the boat.  About 30 meters away was one of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen, only to be surpassed by what I saw the next day.  The colors and countless amount of sea life was fascinating.  I saw colors I didn't know existed and can't quantify into words.  I was snorkeling for what seemed to be minutes, but ended up being around an hour.  Once back in the boat, we had lunch, and then I grabbed some sun on the deck, waiting for my turn to dive.  My turn finally came, but it was too dark to see anything worth while, so my group got pushed back a day, which at the time stunk, but ended up being a blessing in disguise. 

Cyclone

Just thought I should tell you that a cyclone was projected to hit the beach/coast I am currently on, but has now past my current location. It was supposed to hit this morning at 4 am as a category 5 (largest a cyclone can get) and destroy almost everything. I am okay for now, but am waiting on a flight back to school. I will post later about the trip, but just wanted you to know I am fine.