I made it!

I made it!

The 16 hour flight was the longest of my life but thankfully the time passed swiftly with the help of benedryl and free unlimited drinks (is it bad to combine those two?).  From the airport we met the rest of our crew who are also on the abroad program.  There are students from Fordham, Pomona (California), Northwestern and a few other students from other schools. 

After congregating and sharing our common sufferings or celebrations on the just-finished flight over we headed to our bus.  Our first stop was in St. Kilda, which has a great view of Port Phillip and has a lot of hipster shops and tasty restaurants.  My first Australian meal was a pita pocket filled with felafel balls, vegetables and something green that was sliced really thin.  Felafels are made from chickpeas mashed up and formed into balls and then fried.  They are delicious.  After checking out the beach and noticing the leathery back and sunscreen of the bathers we decided to get out of the sun before we ourselves were burned…  Too late for me because I got a light burn on the back of my neck from the intense sun.  Needless to say I applied plenty of sunscreen on from there on. 

After St. Kilda we moved on to a nature preserve where we saw kangaroos and some great Australian scenery.  Finally we moved on to our hotel for our 3 day orientation in Sorrento.  Sorrento is right on a peninsula separating Port Phillip and the Pacific Ocean.  For our Orientation we learned interesting facts about Australian and got acquainted with Australian laws, history and culture. 

Fun Facts:

1.     They eat kangaroo meat here.  Kangaroos are viewed as pests

2.     Australians main form of humor is sarcasm (self-proclaimed)

3.     Vegemite smells like peanut butter, tastes like salt and looks like shit

4.     Australians are obligated to vote and if they don’t they are fined a couple hundred dollars

5.     It is illegal to drive a bicycle with a BAC of greater than 0.05

More to come!