A Much Needed Update

Friday, June 8, 2012

                Friday at school went well.  Since we had a casual on Thursday we couldn’t go to Coles to go shopping.  Yet as soon as the bell rang on Friday and all the kids were in the class we were going to go.  Only three of my boys were there at the beginning of the day, which actually made it easier to go to Coles, fewer kids to key one’s eyes on.  As we were walking to the front of the school to get in the van one more boy showed up to school, but he’s helpful and always helps out when going places.  We head out to the store.  Its always a lot of fun in the van playing music and singing.  When we were in the store everything went fine, it was at check out that one boy started ripping flowers and wanted to pull hair.  On the way to the store I asked them if I could leave school a little early because my climb at the bridge started at 4:15 and usually I get home around  4 so I didn’t know if I was gonna get there in time.  They both just told me to leave at lunch if I wasn’t on duty.  So that’s what I did, it was fine I got to go home before the climb and get in the clothes.

                Three other girls and I made the hike out to the bridge.  We weren’t exactly sure where we were going, but mostly just walked in the direction towards the bridge.  We got there around 4 and its their 80^th anniversary so we actually got a baseball cap for free.  At 4:15 we got going.  We had to fill out paperwork, complete a breath analyzer, get our suits, and gear.  We wore a harness that has this ball that is what gets hooked up when youre climbing up to the top.  We did a simulator flight of stairs of what it was going to be like.  The coolest part was we got to be a part of vivid lights and wear a vest with flashing lights.  We started the hike up.  We are hooked up to the tour guide’s microphone so we can all hear what he is saying.  The four pylons on the bridge do nothing for support; they are just there to make it look pretty.  The total thing was 1400 steps.  We actually didn’t walk up to the top and then go down.  You first walk out above the cars and pedestrian walk way to the top and then cross over and walk back down over the side of the train tracks.  Along the way we took breaks and got pictures taken.  The actual climb isn’t hard. They are like half steps, more of like walking up an incline.  There is the New South Wales flag and the Australia flag at the top of the bridge.  Those are replaced every two months.  Our tour guide was funny and made lots of jokes, he definitely added to it being a good experience.  On the way back down going over the trains was exciting.  The city was great to look at since vivid is still going on, so the city is lit up with colors.  

                After the climb we were starving so we were just gonna start walking until we found a place to eat.  This was a lot harder than it should have been.  Where the bridge climb is in the area called the rocks. The actual area is so pretty, but everything there on a Friday night had a long wait. We ended up walking for 30 minutes and finally gave up and took a train back to Surry Hills and ate at the Strawberry Hills Hotel.  I had my first fish and chips, they were pretty good I must say.  After that I was exhausted so as soon as I got home I went to bed.

Saturday, June 9, 2012

                I woke up at 8 in the morning determined to do a day full of activities to see Sydney.  At around 1030 me and a couple other people headed out into the city to try and do anything basically.  Our first stop was the Museum of Contemporary Art.  It was interesting to say the least.   I’m happy I went, it was actually very small but it did have some interesting things.  On the top floor was a café with a great view of the harbour and the Opera House.  After that we went into the area of the rocks.  They have markets every Saturday starting at 8 and it was nice to just walk around and see whats there.  I found and fell in love with this bar, it’s called the argyle.  I think a couple of us are going to meet there Thursday after work and I’m really excited.  If any of you don’t know, argyle is my favorite word so that’s mainly why I fell in love with it.  The area in the rocks is just a warm family friendly area with a lot to offer and choose from.  We got lunch at pancakes on the rocks.  This place is to die for.  The wait was about 15 minutes, but the line on Friday night was over 2 hours long.  I ordered the vanilla and chocolate surprise.  It was on chocolate pancake with vanilla ice cream on top and one buttermilk pancake with chocolate ice cream on top.  It was delish, I would definitely go back and try something else on their menu.  Only bad part is they don’t split their checks.

After getting lunch we took a ferry out to Cockatoo Island.  It is the largest island in the harbour and it is where they held convicts.  Families come and camp out on the island for weekends.  The one thing I didn’t like about the island is that it seemed like they were trying to repaint things and not just restore.  Some of the buildings did look jail like but others you could tell they basically redid everything in it.  It did hold a lot of convicts and they put them to work, making the buildings on the island and assembling ships and other things.  It had kind of a creepy feeling on the island, not many people were there so we were just walking around by ourselves on the island for most of the time.  Once we were done we took a ferry back to Sydney and decided we should eat dinner at home.  I made a pizza again and I wish I would have taken a short nap because by the end of the day I was really tired.  Our original plan was to get back into the city because in darling harbour there is a jazz festival and every Saturday night there are fireworks.  Well we saw the fireworks from the bus stop because we waited for almost 30 minutes for any bus to pass us to take us anywhere close into the city.  We ended up just walking around darling harbour before heading back to Surry Hills where we stopped at Strawberry Hills for drinks and just talk.  One beer was 6.50, it is just insane how much is costs.  Once we all finally wanted to leave we got some greasy food from across the street.  I got a kebab, which is like a gyro.  It was good but just incredibly greasy.  Once I got home I just went straight to bed. 

Sunday, May 10, 2012

                Let’s see, I woke up at the same time around 8am. Had some difficulties with getting my internet, but got it straightened up luckily.  The same group of people I had been with all day we decided to go out to Manly beach.   It’s about a 40 minute ferry ride north of Sydney.  The area there is gorgeous. A lot of people live out there, just not as crammed as the city. Along the area and tons and tons of hikes you can take along the coast that take you into national parks and along different harbours.  Well as soon as our ferry was pulling up it started pouring and the rain didn’t let up at all.  We had come in manly in mind with getting kangaroo burgers so we headed there thinking the rain might stop in a while.  After getting soaked we found the place called Moo Burgers.  All of us ordered a kangaroo burger.  On it was sage and garlic, caramelized onions, tomato, rocket, home-made mayonnaise, and beetroot relish.  We all got it to say we tried kangaroo, and it was pretty good. I don’t know if I went back there that I would order another one, a lot of their other burgers sounded really good.  It was definitely worth trying though. 

Once we finished eating the rain had not let up.  We walked to the beach in the rain and stood around for a while and watching the people out surfing.  The coolest thing then happened.  As we were standing there we saw about 40 dolphins swim across the beach.  Everyone on their surf boards sat and watched them swim by them.  All the dolphins were so close to them, it must have been insane to watch them.  Just watching them come up and then dive back in was so cool. After that, we just walked back in the pouring rain looking through the town.  We rain and caught a ferry back into the city.  After that we were all tired and just headed back to the apartments.  Everyone from purdue ended up staying in the night and we all chilled in one room and socialized.  It had been a while since we all were together again. 

Monday, June 11, 2012

                It’s the Queen’s birthday which means no school! But of course it’s been pouring all day so I don’t want to do anything.  I made sure to catch up on sleep and basically have sat in the room, watched AFL, which I like more than rugby I’ve found out.  And mostly have tried to catch up on writing this.  I get so lazy on the weekends when it comes to writing this.  Which is odd cause I have more time on the weekends to actual put the time into writing it.  There is a hotel in Surry Hills that has a Mexican Mondays kind of deal.  It’s depressing how much I miss Mexican food, there is such a small Hispanic population here so it’s almost impossible to find Mexican food.  I might go do that, if its pouring I probably won’t because it’s too close to take a bus, which makes somewhat of a walk to make.  All to say the Queen’s birthday has been uneventful, which I’m okay with.