A Series of (very) Fortunate Events

Hi people! Thanks for reading my blog! I just spent the last 30 minutes trying to think of a url for this blog and was seriously disappointed when I discovered that both semesterabroad.blogspot.com and queenofqueensland.blogspot.com were already taken (but kudos to me for trying, right?). Naturally, I decided to see what these blogs had on them. Get ready to be seriously disappointed. The first one was dedicated to a bride communicating to her future bridesmaids about dresses and the second was about a girl's trip to australia, but NEITHER OF THEM HAD ANYTHING POSTED. Check them out if you don't believe me.

Anyway, enough of that. Hello from Brisbane! I am currently sitting at my ridiculously long desk in my room at St. John's College, an on campus college residence for students of University of Queensland, in St. Lucia (pronounced Saynt-Luu-Shaa) in a quiet area of the city of Brisbane, Australia! I would really like to document my experience of my semester abroad here, but unfortunately that might bore most of you (all of you) to death. As many of you know, most of my stories are just extremely hyped up mundane experiences (ie buying a bagel, drinking water, or that time I sang too loudly etc). So, it's one thing to be tricked into hearing those stories that always begin with "The funniest thing ever just happened!!" only to discover it is an utterly mundane and un-extraordinary 5 second interaction of how I embarrassed myself, but if you do choose to continue and voluntarily suffer through this, then yay #truefriends!!!!

So let's see, what has happened over the past few days so far...

Heading to Philly Airport!

• Took four flights (Philadelphia --> Toronto --> Vancouver --> Sydney --> Brisbane) upon which I psychoanalyzed myself and came to the conclusion that they must have drugged me in my sleep because I was being so chill about this whole thing. So then I decided to listen to some T-Pain and eat an apple. Also in order to make the 50lb weight limit, I had to take out a few things and reorganize my luggage, so I was wearing a sweater that I had to take out around my neck for the entire trip. Very weird looking (see below). Kinda regretting that decision. 

   

  In Vancouver airport!

Distance Traveled: 8049 Miles
Distance to Destination: 0 Miles
But then I had to get on another flight to Brisbane :/

Me + my damn overweight sweater

On my way to Brisbane!

Goodbye planes and airports! Hello Brisbane!

• Best part: Apparently, upon arriving to Australia, the crew is instructed to spray an unknown spray onto all of the passengers and our carry on baggage. Probably one of the funniest sights I've ever seen. I felt like I was living in hairspray, because that's what it smelled like and honestly, no one even knew what it was. so like, okay cool. 
• On the car ride from airport to St. John's I was totally geeking out. I think I just meant to write freaking, but I wrote geeking. Whatever, over it. So like, obvi they drive on the other side of the road here, but since I was in the passenger front seat (which is the side of the drivers side in America) I kept feeling like SO weird and had like a where-is-the-steering-wheel-omg-should-i-be-driving-right-now?-omg-nevermind-omg-this-is-weird moment every 5 seconds. I swear the mini freak outs sped up my metabolism or something. #nevermind
• Got to St. John's, twas chill
• Met a couple of Americans
• Bought some shower stuff
• ...wait for it...
• Took a shower
• ^BUT PLZ DONT UNDERESTIMATE THAT STEP, THE SHOWERS ARE SO NICE HERE. I wish I could explain. It's just such a smart set up. There's like a locked room and then with in the room is a shower, with the nicest pressure, anyway, overall an incredible experience. 
• Then I hung out with Americans, which included a big group from Gettysburg and some other individual people from various schools. We took a bus to the city and then walked around a mall and then ate food at a beautifully set up and lighted night noodle market. 

Pretty clutch

Pretty Brisbane

• It was so cute, there were like laterns everywhere and at one point a big dragon came out, but then of course, I discovered that I have an awful fear of them because everyone always gets kidnapped or bad things happen when they are around (ie in Mulan and White Chicks) but anyway, then I got over my fear and attempted to take some selfies but they were floppin around so the pics are sorta blurry and it was pretty crazy. One had really aggressive lighting and I swear the people inside were trying to break dance or something, but it just ended up making the dragon look really spastic and trippy.

me and normal (not that you can tell) dragon

the spastic, dubstep remix dragon

More dragon selfies

• Then it was really cold, so we went back and of course its only 8 pm so naturally I fell asleep #jetlag

All of the lights, all of the lights

That brings us to today, Saturday the 19th!

• I woke up and decided to explore a little street of some stores and restaurants and cafes called St. Lucia Village. Very close to St. John's, which is nice. So I REALLY needed caffeine so I went into a little cafe and asked "Can I get a coffee?" and the barista answered "Yes? What kind?" but then I realized I knew nothing about coffee in Australia so I was like "Um um um um"and she could see I was struggling so to help she named some variations (flat, mocha, latte, cappacino) and I was like "I guess the flat coffee?" (well my reasoning at the time was that flat sounded like "boring" to me so I figured it was just black coffee. but of course, it wasnt) but it ended up being a good decision because I later googled it and found out it was just a couple shots of expresso with steamed milk, so it was probably as unfancy as I could get. But then again, i could be totally wrong. not really sure. it was super pretty though!

My first "Flat" Coffee

• Then I bought some navel oranges (arguably my favorite fruit...or is it unarguably because its so obvious no one would bother arguing... I don't know...anyway) and they were delicious!

• Then I skyped with Papa Gabai and organized my room.

ME IN MY SINGLE!!! 

• Also I tried a new toothpaste I just bought (7/10 stars)

Me and my new toothpaste

• Then I got a visit from The Warden of St. John's. Funny story, I still don't know his name because well, honestly I forget what he introduced himself as, but I think it was "Hi, I am the Warden" and even though he invited me to tea tomorrow and gave me a handwritten invitation, you can see that it still only identifies him as "The Warden." So I'm feeling kinda like I am in Holes right now...well except for the obvious differences of situation as there are no holes, no orange jumpsuits, the showers are nice, I am not a convict, and the Warden is treating the new members to tea and not scraping their faces with poisonous snake venom nail polish...but then again, I don't know what "tea" really entails so that could still easily be on the agenda for tomorrow.  Alright, now here I am babbling about absolutely nothing. See ya on the flip side!

THE WARDEN!!!