I am having the time of my life here!!! Since I last posted, I visited the Blue Mountains with my friends Lizzie (from Ohio) and Emma (from Russia), went surfing at Bondi, and started some amazing classes at the University of Sydney, making friends of all nationalities everywhere. The Blue Mountains were breathtaking, especially since we obviously do not quite have mountains in Florida. I will never forget the site of the Three Sisters and cannot wait to go camping there for a class I am enrolled in. Surfing in Bondi was every bit as spectacular as I had imagined (never believing I would actually be there one day) and I am THRILLED to go back and surf again. I was going to go last weekend but the waves were 6-9ft which is WAY bigger than this Florida girl could handle. Of my four classes, I am especially loving my Foundations of Business Law one. The topics are extremely appealing to me and I am eager to participate in “tutorials” and learn more every lecture. I have made lovely friends in all of my classes and it is fun getting to know the different cultures everyone comes from.
A total highlight of my trip so far has been when I went to the Botanical Gardens to find the area where wild cockatoos and lorikeets fly to you… I FOUND IT. Anyone who has ever met me knows about my obsession with birds and therefore this was the experience of a lifetime and had me in tears from smiling and laughing so hard. Wild cockatoos were landing on me and lorikeets came soon after! They did not even want the food I brought them, just wanted to hang out with me. I will NEVER forget that. Every time I see a wild cockatoo in the city or somewhere squawking away I crack up so hard that people stare at me and start laughing too.
Tomorrow I am going for a hike in the Royal National Park with my Learning in the Outdoors class. I find this class crucial to my full Australian experience as it is led by Australian professors/ lecturers and shows us Australia from a nature perspective which I am especially into, as cheesy as it sounds, probably because of the same reasons that caused me to choose philosophy as a major.
My host family is absolutely perfect and I adore them more every day! I will definitely be coming to stay with them after this program is over. We have different shows we watch certain nights of the week (Bosch, The Voice, and some others) and their son and his wife remind me of my brother and his girlfriend so that makes me feel even more at home. The reason I have not been posting as often as I should is because I have been staying away from technology and joying my experiences to the highest level without having a phone in my face.. however, there will be pictures soon to come and I cannot wait to post another blog with adventures from the hike 🙂
Cheers, mates!