sorry!!

hey everyone, sorry it's been so long since my last post. i know everyone's been dying to hear what i've been up to, but mostly it's been school work. i've really cut back on my going out on the weekends in hopes to save a little money. i did the math and if i had kept up my old ways i wouldn't have lasted til jan!! so, within the last month i: went to alice springs and uluru, had a job interview @ an ice cream place, went whale watching, went to canberra, and had 1 out of 3 of my huge papers due, on tuesday i will be helping a PhD student w/some research and on friday i'm going to a big halloween party! now i know that hasn't really told you anything abt what i've really been doing, so the details are below. if you would like to read then, be my guest. if not...well there isn't really anything i can do abt that, so just read them if you want :-P

*alice springs, uluru and the olgas-sep 29-oct 2:
this was my 1st flight since i'd been to oz and i was very excited to go traveling. as you know i'd been on a few little day trips here and there, but this was my 1st real trip. it was my spring break so i had all week off from school and wanted to make it worth my while. my flight left @ 8am, so i made sure to call the cab to get me to the airport w/plenty of time. there aren't any rules abt liquids here, but i still had no idea what to expect. little did i know that when i got to the airport i would be through security and to my gate w/in 5mins!! i didn't even have to take off my shoes! so...since i had plenty of time to kill waiting at my gate, i decided to finish my book. i'd been reading a daddy recommended book "in a sunburned country" all abt australia and it really gave me a good idea of what to expect. good job pops ;) so w/my book finished (don't worry i had planned ahead and gone TO THE LIBRARY!! to rent another one-"a brave new world") i just sat around the gate and looked out the window. once on the plane (i had a window seat :-D woohoo) i took a little nap, but was careful not to sleep the whole time (3 hr flight to get to central oz) cause i wanted to see the outback below. i struck up a little convo w/the father and daughter sitting next to me, and watched the red earth go by below. i tired to take some pics of it, but they aren't even close to portraying to the beautiful colors. once at the tiny airport, we unloaded at the tarmac and were welcomed by many cute little signs in different languages. it was hot, but even still wearing my jacket, i wasn't sweating. i got in a cab who drove me abt 15-20mins to my hotel...which was beautiful. even from the cab i could see that alice springs wasn't what you would call a fancy town. think, middle of no where southwest. they did have car dealerships and plenty of pubs, but there wasn't anything pretty abt it. once in my hotel i flipped through a few tv channels and went exploring in the town. there was a mall nearby that i could i would survey so i would know what stores to go to on wed (aka my day in alice springs). i had planned out my trip so i would have 2 days of travel, a day at uluru w/a tour group, and a day in alice springs. little did i know that the mall was a target and maybe 7 clothing stores, 5 souvenir shops, and 2 jewelry stores. so since that didn't really take up as much time as i had hoped i continued on my exploration of alice springs. there were many other people around, even in the hot afternoon, but i could tell they were all tourists as well. i made my way to the grocery store and bought some breakfast and dinner foods, so i wouldn't have to spend a ton of extra money at restaurants. i made my way back to my hotel and thought i would go sit by the pool. it was abt 5pm and the sun was hidden by the building side, so i just sat and started my new book. there was however, a bit of a commotion. 2 young boys, prob 11 and 15, were sitting in the hot tub (aka spa as they call it here), laughing and enjoying themselves, as brothers often do...when they're not fighting abt something. after abt 20mins they got out and went for a swim in the pool. a short while later a man and his young daughter, maybe 7 or 8, came down to enjoy the water. the little girl got in the spa, but was only in there for ~2mins...not even, before getting out and whispering something to her dad. he then walked over to the spa, looked @ something, and then angrily walked back. other people @ the pool were wondering what he was looking @...as was i, and he said that someone had pooed in the spa! he automatically blamed the 2 boys that were in it previously but they said that it wasn't them and they had just noticed and that's why they got out. the man didn't think that made any sense because his daughter had noticed the poo after only being in the spa for 2 mins, and the boys were in there for 20! accusations were made and the man started arguing w/the boys parents...and that was enough for me, it was too hard to read w/all the noise and since i couldn't get in the spa, i went back to my room. the tour i had arranged was going to pick me up @ 5:55am! so i called it an early night.

in the morning i boarded a freezing cold coach bus, and we drove around the town picking up other tourists from their hotels. we then started on our 3hr car ride to uluru. now, incase you're not up on your oz/aborigine politics, uluru used to be called ayre's rock. it is in central oz and the world's largest monolith (gigantic stone). if you've seen pics of a huge red rock from oz...that's the one. it was an all day tour...and when i say all day, i mean they picked me up at 6am and we weren't planning on returning until 2am. i slept most of the ride to the half way point, mount ebenezer, where we stopped at a small camping, restaurant, art gallery place. i bought some aboriginal art! :-D and got back on the bus so ride the rest of the way to uluru. on the way there we stopped at a look out hill to see lake amadeus. a HUGE salt lake in central oz, well it's supposed to be a lake, but the 5+ yr drought made it more of a salt flat. it was huge, but the thing i was more in love w/was the sand! it was beautiful!!! so fine and smooth, and the most amazing color. after a few more hrs of driving/sleeping, we arrived at the national park. turns out the aborigines own the land, because it's sacred to them, but the gov leases it from them so tourists can come visit. the olgas are a small grouping of monoliths, just like ayres rock, but aren't as famous because they are not one continuous monolith. the walked around them for a while and that's when it got really hot. it was the middle of the day...in the desert...in australia. i think it was almost 95oF (of course the aussie's would say the temp in Celsius...which i'm still trying to get used to). we went to the tourist center, and ate our bag lunches and then went to the rock!!! let me tell you, you really cannot tell how huge it really is until you're standing next to it. it's not huge in a tall way, but in a massive way. you really feel like it's a gigantic red boulder just sitting in the middle of the desert, solid and unmovable. you can still climb the rock, even though there are signs everywhere from the natives asking you not to climb out of respect, but that day it was closed cause it was too windy. apparently people have died trying to climb it! not people 100s of yrs ago...people maybe just 15 yrs ago. someone's hat blows off and they reach to grab it and oops, there they go off the edge. if you look @ my pics you can see the climb path...it looks scary and i'm almost glad that it was closed! we toured around the base of the rock, learning abt aboriginal legends and looking at old cave art (very cool). an hour or so before sunset we headed to the 'sunset viewing area', where all the tour buses gather to see if the rock will change to beautiful colors in the setting sun, and eat dinner. our tour guides prepared wonderful bangers (aka sausages) for us, and we sipped on wine and champagne in the setting desert sun. the rock didn't change any cool colors, but it was still a nice evening. we then jumped back on the bus...tired and slightly drunk, and started our way back to alice. again we stopped at mount ebenezer, and i bought sophie a bday present before continuing on our journey home. when i got back to my hotel room, the plan was to shower and get in bed asap. if you look @ my pics you'll see how red my skin got from the sand. taylor seemed to think the pic of my feet was to see how swollen they looked...but no taylor, that's just how feet look, thanks :-P

the next morning i woke up and headed to the alice springs reptile center. one of the highlights in the town, and known for it's salt water croc named terry. when i arrived and paid, they said that the out door area was closed, and i overheard a woman say something about the police. i peeked out the window but nothing look out of the ordinary, so i though maybe it was break time for the outside...who knows. i took my sweet time looking at all the snaked and lizards native to australia and worked on getting good pics of the zoo collection. since i didn't really have much else to do that day, i knew i should make it last. there were 2 rooms w/animals and a large room full of fossils where they were showing a movie. after slowly making my way around the room, taking up time reading all the captions and watching the entire movie, i asked the woman at the front desk when the outside would open again. she said it already had, so i made my way to the back. there were many cool reptiles outside, and terry was a big disappointment because he was mostly hidden, and there was still not sign of anything having gone wrong. i went back inside and watched the demo, where you got to hold some of the creatures. i took a few pics with a blue tongue lizard and held the shingle back lizard. then i'd seen about all i could see and started to leave. as i walked out the door i over heard a little boy telling the woman at the desk that he knew what happened...here's where it gets interesting.

boy-i know what happened
woman-what do you mean what happend?
boy-i know what happened with the crocodile.
woman-oh, what do you mean? (acting very suspicious) who told you that?
boy-i talked to sara, she told me about the boy and the crocodile and... (his mother covers his mouth)
woman-okay, that's enough. you don't need to be talking about that.

it was very strange, and i didn't find out until i got home what had happened. according to the news, a 7yr old boy had jumped the fence outside and killed several reptiles with rocks before feeding them to terry!! here's the news article if you want to read it. it's crazy! imagine being that boy's parents!!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7649876

i then walked around town and made my way up billy goat hill, which offered a view of the city, but wasn't really anything special. it was getting really hot and i was actually kind of bored, so i went back to my hotel to have lunch. i've been trying different types of aussie meats since i've been here and for lunch i had a camel wrap! i couldn't really tell what the meat tasted like because there were so many onions, but i'm sure it was just like beef. i went to my room, and took a nap...mostly because i didn't have anything else to do. when i woke up i went back out and made my way up anzac hill at the opposite end of town from billy goat hill. it was much nicer and had a small monument at the top (anzac stands for australian, new zealand, army corps and they're honored all over the country w/street names and museums). i did a little souvenir shopping and went home for the night. however, when i bought my food for the week i hadn't realized that there was no microwave, so i thaw my dinner i had to fill the sink w/hot water and wait...it wasn't very affective, but it kind of worked. that's abt as magiver as i get ;)

the next day i did a few last min things around town and hoped on the shuttle bus to the airport. on the way there, while i was reading my book, i noticed that i was almost done with it! now those of you that know me, know i'm not a reader. i had once been assigned to read 'brave new world' and was unable to finish it in time for the assignments and simply read the cliff's notes. i was really having a hard time understanding why i couldn't finish it before when after 3 days i was almost done. i searched all over the cover of the book to try to figure out what the deal was, and finally i saw that it was an abbreviated version!!! awesome. i had basically just wasted 3 days of reading a book, and i didn't even really read the book. abbreviated versions don't count! i went ahead and finished it anyway, but i was really disappointed :( on my plane ride home i talked to a guy abt cool places to visit in new zealand, but unfortunately i forgot all of them...oops. i had a terrible cab ride home which cost me $20 more than i expected and then had to walk up the street just to be able to pay my rent on time. bleh, what a way to end a great trip.

*job interview @ cold rock-oct 7:
not much to say abt this one, but i went for my interview and they asked me silly questions like 'do you like ice cream?' and said they would let me know by sunday if i got the job. on friday i get an email saying they are 'not continuing with my application'. apparently i was supposed to say i didn't like ice cream?? and it's an awesome booster that as a woman w/my masters i can't even get a job as an ice cream scooper! i can't wait to try to find a real job back in the states...THAT'LL be fun!

*whale watching-oct 9:
my class went out on a profession whale watching cruise in the sydney harbor. i'd never been whale watching before and i was really excited. we followed around a mother and baby humpback whale for a few hours and i got some good pics. the baby was breeching all over the place, and we also saw several common dolphins (much diff than bottlenose). you'll have to check out my pics, it was a beautiful day :) later that day i get an email abt my nz classes. before we start classes we got on 2 field trips to get data for a project that's due later that semester. originally i was told the trips would be in jan, so i told nathan to move his leave from june to feb, so he could come to nz for my bday! well...the email tells me that we will be gone most of feb. GREAT. i told nathan to see if he could move his leave again, but he said it's gonna be rough because he had a hard enough time changing it from june to feb, and not to change it to march...well we'll see what happens. i haven't heard anything yet :-\

*canberra, floriade, parliament, and the war memorial-oct 11:
the last day tour i had planned for myself was the canberra, the oz capital. after having seen so many state capitals in my days, i thought i needed to go see the official australian on too. i was a 3hr bus ride south, into the mountains and farm land. when the gov was trying to find an official capital melbourne and sydney fought, so they picked someplace in the middle so now one would win. hahaha, sounds like a mom solution to me! there was a huge flower festival there, called floriade. hundreds of people get together and plant flowers in pictures. the theme this year was 'movies that influenced australia', most of them i had never heard of but it was still beautiful. it was also kind of hard to see the images they created because you couldn't get a bird's eye view, so i mainly just enjoyed the pretty colors :) i did see a black swan family, they were so cute, mom and dad w/3 cute grey chicks :) we also visited parliament house where the oz government is. they have a house of rep and a senate just like the US, but they run everything like the British do. again, i'm not so in to politics, so i had little idea of how that all works, even after the tour. the last stop on our trip was the to the australian war memorial. i was just expecting a few plaques lying around and maybe some flowers left by family members, but it was really something. not only was there a beautiful memorial, but there was also a jam backed museum. i took a few cool pics, so check those out too. when they closed the memorial at sunset, they had a bagpipe player play and it was very beautiful. unfortunately the video i took got cut in half because i didn't have enough room on my memory card. so after i deleted some old pics i got the rest of the song. the first video is below if you want to watch it. then we headed on home.


*since then i've just been working on my papers like i said. the one i finished was about the management of the ground parrot. i know...super interesting right? the one i'm working on now is on the effects of international fishing on petrels in the southern hemisphere...again, super interesting. i watched all the prez debates and voted already, so no worries all you patriotic americans out there, i'm done my part :) everyone i meet here is very excited to see what will happen, and they all hope obama wins...and think he will. my french roommate had no doubts that he's already the winner...i'm not making any guesses and i'll have to wait until nov 5th to see what happens (and yes i know election day is nov 4, but that's nov 5th here ;) i'm so smart). the research i'm doing tomorrow is w/a PhD student who's studying bats here in sydney. originally i thought i would be helping her trap the bats and was really excited, but now i find out that we're just collecting insects :-\ not as exciting, but hey, experience is experience. the halloween party i'm going to on friday should be lots of fun, cause it's a bunch of international students from my program. aussie's don't really celebrate halloween, so we foreigners have got to get together and live it up! i'm going to the be the statue of liberty...but i haven't gotten my costume together yet! we're planning a thanksgiving dinner @ my prof's house, which should be fun, and we're doing a turkey trot 1mile run before hand...i'll let you know how it goes! what else...i've been going to the gym abt 3 times a week, and i don't feel much fitter...although i'm sure i am. i'm gettin good @ cooking kangaroo meat. and if you want anything for xmas send me your address :) that's all for now, and i'll try to be better abt posting once i'm done w/all my papers.