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Monday, 29 June 2009

"You Say Ta-MAY-Toe, I Say Tah-MAA-Toe"
With no classes to attend, no exams to study for, and (quite frankly) no interest in doing anything other than turning into a lazy blob for the next few days, I decided to put together another post on the differences between Kansas and Oz.
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- "Hotels" are not usually real hotels - they're bars or pubs. So, when you see "Mosman Hotel, The Clock Hotel, Cremorne Hotel, Harp Hotel", etc, they aren’t typically places to sleep, they're places to perform that favourite of all Aussies' past-times, drink.
- Devestatingly, "lemonade" is not lemonade - it's Sprite or 7-Up. You can’t really find what we think of as lemonade in many places , but if you ever do find it (after promptly calling to inform me where you discovered this precious rarity,) you'll discover it will be called "traditional or real lemonade."
- Entrees actually are entrees. And by this I mean they come before your main course, as they should. Entrees in the US ARE the main course, but, in the rest of the world, entree means appetizer or starter. So, don’t order an entree and expect it to be big enough to fill you up!
- "Ta" means thank you. Because yes; it seems that (to keep up with that laid-back attitude Aussies are renowned for) even saying "thank you" uses too much energy.
- There's not such thing as "ketchup," and (if you make that rookie "American Traveling Overseas" mistake of asking for "ketchup," you will likely be the center of a few laughs in the room until someone graciously explains that they don't have "that," they have "ta-maa-toe sauce." And is just that: a thin, slightly sloppy paste made from tomatoes. Their "pasta sauce" is our "tomato sauce."
- Along with driving on the left, walking on the left, taking the stairs on the left, escalators are also "built" on the left. Back in the States, if you take a series of escalators to, say, the fifth floor, you'll begin on the first floor, on an escalator going up. Once you reach the next floor, you typically turn 180 degrees to your left and hop onto the next escalator. Here, you would make that rotation to the right, maintaining that "driving on the left" mentality.
- On another note, the first floor isn't the first floor, here. It's the "ground floor." At the University of Wollongong, classrooms are listed by building number, floor number, and room number. For example, my Chemistry Lab class took place in 41-340 this last session. That stands for "Building 41 (the Science Building), 3rd Floor, Room 40. Similarly, my Anatomy Lab class was in 41-G04 - Building 41, Ground Floor, Room 4.
- If you thought Starbucks was a confusing place in which to order coffee, you’ve never tried in Australia. They don’t seem to call it the way we call it in America, and it took a a few days (and a few misordered products) to work it all out. Of course, once you learn the lingo, it actually makes a little bit of sense.
  Short Black: This is a single shot of espresso.
  Long Black: Espresso with water (1/3 espresso 2/3 water). If you want a close approximation of a regular cup ‘o joe, order a long black. It’s equivalent to a Cafe Americano ordered in your local coffeehouse.
  Simple, yeah? Well, I hope you didn’t want milk with that. That’s where the confusion starts.
  Flat White: This is a popular drink in Australia and New Zealand. As far as I know, it’s not served anywhere else in the world. A flat white is an espresso with steamed milk (about 1/3 espresso, 2/3 milk). The closest approximation in America would be a no foam latte.
  So, what if you want a regular cup o’ joe with milk? You order a Long Black with Milk on the Side. This gives you cold milk to add to your long black. Thankfully, I was able to discover a latte is a just your normal latte and a cappaccino is a cappaccino. (Something normal!!)

Thursday, 25 June 2009

done, Done, and DONE!

Whew! I made it: as of 2:43 PM yesterday arvo, I am officially done with exams! Yes! (Now comes the nerve-racking part where I wait to find out if I managed to scrape a pass in Chemistry and Anatomy...) Fuuuuuun. :)
Chemistry Exam = EPIC FAIL! It was, without a doubt, the hardest, worst exam I've ever had to take. And the fact that all the chemistry majors came out of it convinced they'd failed and exclaiming how they didn't understand any of the questions wasn't encouraging at all. Seriously, if Tennis Dave thinks he may have failed it, there's no hope for the rest of us mere mortals.
My Anatomy Theory Exam wasn't nearly as hard as I anticipated it would be. Still, I don't know if I did well enough to have earned a passing grade. What with having glandular fever and being knocked out of classes for two weeks, I definitely struggled on my mid-term exam (translated as, didn't pass it), which increased the pressure for my Anatomy Practical Exam and the Theory Exam. Fortunately, I nailed the Prac. Exam, scoring a (frankly, quite shocking) 117/120, but the theory exam was 165 questions and I'm not convinced I did well enough to have made up for my mid-term. Still, I put my best effort in and, well, if I have to take it again, I'll be that much ahead of everyone else. :P
I had my Psychology Exam yesterday. It wasn't particularly difficult, and I'm pretty sure I pulled a good grade off in it.
And my BioMedical Sciences Exam I had last Tuesday was pretty easy as well, although the fact that it was worth 60% of my final grade definitely added some pressure. Seriously, how intimidating is it knowing that you can either pass or fail a class depending on one three hour exam? Yikes! I'm not a fan. I appreciate the American method all the more, now when you have multiple exams throughout the semester, resulting in a final exam that is typically worth no more than 20%, possibly 25%.
Still, it's a good feeling being done, come what may.
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On the other hand, it's not quite as good a feeling being stuck sick in bed...again! I sound like I've been smoking two packs a day since I was 12, I'm running a remarkably impressive fever (and also bear a striking resemblance to a beet as you've ever seen in a human), and I've developed an entirely new appreciation and respect for how difficult it is to function as an old, arthritic woman.
"R-E-S-P-E-C-T!"
*****
One of my best mates from back home is coming out to visit in a few days. I'm SO excited! We're going to go on a trip up to Cairnes (heat and sunshine!) and the Great Barrier Reef (Nemo!!). It's going to be brilliant fun.

Sunday, 07 June 2009

What Did I Do Today??

Final exams.
I had been composing a long, winded explanation for you all as to why I had been so long absent from my blog but finally decided that sentence pretty much summed up my paragraphs of excuses. ;)
*****
Want to know what my Sunday schedule has been today?
6:30 AM: My first action of the day was to kill mt alarm clock by hurling it at brick wall. It's astounding, really, the sheer volume a tiny battery-powered alarm clock barely the size of my palm can generate.
6:32 AM: I actually got out of bed, then promptly leapt back in as soon as my skin experienced the dramatic difference in temperatures between my bed (warm and toasty) and my room which had (quite alarmingly) acquired the frigid temperatures of Antarctica overnight.
6:32 (and 10 seconds) AM: I ventured to extend arm outside of the "safety zone" and switched on my most awesome heater beside my bed.
6:35 AM: I determined by cautious experimentation that the air near the heater was actually significantly warmer than in previous minutes, indicating that the room would soon be back to normal living temperatures. Twisting my dunna (that's Aussie for "comforter," by the way) around me, I groped towards the foot of my bed and grabbed the fuzzy and oh-so-vibrantly-orange bathrobe Jill gave me. Time for a shower.
6:36 AM: I looked like Frankenstein's bride. With disasterous hair, bleary eyes, shampoo bottles, toothpaste, and a toothbrush bursting out of the pockets on my shockingly orange bathrobe, I staggered haphazardly down the hallway towards the showers. Wouldn't you know it, though: Jess had already claimed one of the two showers, and I judged from the melodious tunes issuing over the shower door that it was the "good" shower, too.
*Sidenote: there are two showers at my end of C-1: the "good" shower and the "evil, sucky, why-do-we-even-HAVE-that-shower?" shower.
Now, the distinction between these two showers would (on the surface) appear fairly minimal: one has what we refer to as the "drought-proof" shower head while the other has the "drought" head.
"Drought-proof" is pure awesomeness. It's basically a big disk about the size of a teacup saucer, half an inch thick, and absolutely riddled with holes. It pours an deluge of water down on top of you, and (as an additional bonus) uses a different water heater than the "evil, sucky, why-do-we-even-HAVE-that-shower?" shower, meaning that you aren't either burned to death or frozen solid every time someone upstairs flushes a toilet or takes a shower.
"Drought" on the other hand is one of those shower heads becoming increasingly popular among Australian politicians. These little (emphasis on the word little) showerheads have been equipped with a handy dandy waterflow regulator as an attempt to combat the drought issue Australians have been dealing with for the past decade. The result is that you stand under an absolutely tiny (think the dent inside a teacup saucer...you know, the one that holds the teacup?) showerhead that dribbles a meager pittance of water onto your freezing, soapy head. Clearly, Australian politicans don't use these things otherwise they would have long ago figured out that you use an additional fifteen or twenty litres of water just trying to rinse your hair out than you would with the "good" showerhead. Oh, and by the way, the water handles on the "evil" shower are incredibly tempermental which means that your time in the water is spent at the whim of the water heater. Who knows? At the flush of a toilet, it may decide to become scalding, or it just might decide to see how close it can go to 0 degrees without actually freezing the pipes.*
So, there I was, at 6:36 AM, standing on the tiles in the bathroom, staring at the "evil" shower.

6:37 AM: Taking a deep breath, I walked into the "evil" shower.
6:41 AM: I swiftly excited the "evil" shower, and raced back down the hall towards my room. Standing in my bedroom, I surveyed the damage to my person: patches of red, burned skin and blue fingers, toes and lips could be dealt with, but I was going to have a harder time recovering from the shampoo bubbles still clingingly determinedly to my hair.
6:42 AM: "To heck with it," I thought, grabbed my water bottle and marched back to the bathroom where I gracelessly stuck my head under the sink faucet and, using my water bottle to get the tricky bits, attempted to rinse the remainder of soap suds from my brunette hair.
6:45 AM: At least most of the suds were out...
6:46 AM: While I appreciated the efforts of my radiator, my bedroom was still on the decidedly chilly side, so I pulled on a pair of warm sweatpants and my favourite CHP sweatshirt and headed down to the common room to make a cup of coffee.
6:50 AM: With a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and a toasted bagel from the bread basket in the other, I walked back into my bedroom which was finally starting to heat up to tolerable temperatures.
6:55 AM: I finished tidying up my small square of a bedroom and settled myself at my desk for some study.
.....studying, studying, studying, studying, studying.....
8:45 AM: I replaced my sweats with some dressier apparel, pocketed my keycard and made my way out of Weerona, past the tennis courts, over the rugby oval, and across Gipps Road to St. Bridgid's, the local Catholic parish. (The ushers love me there, by the way, because they think American accents sound so funny.)
10:08 AM: Basically reverse the above paragraph... ;)
10:15 AM: Score! Pancakes, crumpets, bananas, strawberries, and hot chocolate for brekkie!
10:45 AM: Socializing, newspaper-reading (you can't imagine how oblivious I am to the outside world here, except for when it comes to the Sunday paper), and a full tummy later, I made my way across the courtyard from A-Block back to my room in C-Block.
10:46 AM: I turned my iTunes on shuffle and settled myself at my desk again.
.....studying, studying, studying, studying, studying.....
1:30 PM: Snags-and-Steak Barbie! *Thank goodness for Sunday S.R. Barbies. The Senior Residents put on snags-and-steak barbies every Sunday to help us get through the long interval between breakfast and dinner at 6 PM and everyone loves them for it!*
2:00 PM: An extra snag wrapped in a paper napkin (to counter "the munchies" later), I headed back to my room.
.....studying, studying, studying, studying, studying.....
2:45 PM: A quick glance out my window revealed that the sun had actually managed to break free from the repressive clouds that had been covering the skies for the past three weeks. I eagerly seized the opportunity to get some vitamin D, grabbed up my books and iPod and headed for the picnic table by Weerona East.
.....studying, studying, studying, studying, studying.....
4:20 PM: The sun had disappeared behind the clouds once again, and a few threatening raindrops had made some lovely splashes on the ground beside me, so I retreated back to C-Block.
.....studying, studying, studying, some green tea, studying.....
6:15 PM: A rumbling in my stomach indicated that, regardless of the fact that I'd simply been studying all day, I was still in need of some extra energy, so I drifted back to the dining hall in A-Block for some sustinence.
6:50 PM: Revived by green beans, potatoes, and ravioli, I cleared my dishes away, said "Ciao" to my tablemates and disappeared once again into my room.
.....studying, studying, hot coffee, studying, studying.....
12:05 PM: My brain feels too full to read another line from my anatomy book or to attempt another equilibrium equation. Solution? Update my blog.
;)
And here we are: it's 12:23 PM. I've studied over 14 hours today. I think I'm entitled to call it quits and hit the hay. Love!

Friday, 29 May 2009

Cultural Arrogance

There's a large number of American students here at Weerona, studying abroad for a semester. But what really bothers me is how, well, American they are.
"Yeah, yeah," you say, "but you're an American, too, girl! Or did you somehow forget your nationality or neglect to hear yourself speak with your distinctly American accent any time recently?"
Now I'm not claiming to be "un-American," here. Not even remotely. No, what I'm going to attempt to show here is the distinction between Traveled Americans and Traveling Americans. And believe me, there's a difference.
I'll admit it: I like to consider myself as a fairly well-traveled and cultural individual. I've been to more than fourteen countries (several for extended periods of time), have lived completely immersed in multiple diverse cultures, and have ambitions to further explore and venture around the globe.
Before I came to Weerona, I'd never perceived myself as being remotely different than any other American overseas. I always assumed I was a typical Traveling American. However, after observing the other American students here, I've been struck by the variations in attitude, opinions, and adaptions between "them" and me.
You see, one of the primary things I've done since I've arrived here (after the jetlag and general confusion had dissipated slightly) has been to acquaint myself with my fellow Australian students, and begin exploring the differences between the Australian and American cultures. I've eagerly applied myself to listening to people discussing their lives and traditions, noting the way Australians interacted with each other as opposed to foreigners. I've begun to learn the widely used Aussie slang words and phrases. And, of course, I've enjoyed Australian cuisine (for the record, that involves eating spaghetti as well as baked beans on toast during the breakfast hours - yeah, I was a little surprised by that combination, LOL!)
However, as I watched my fellow Americans arrive at college, I was intrigued by the fact that, after initially making an effort to acquaint themselves with the Australians here, they quickly reverted back to their own nationality when it came to making friends.
Maybe it's just me, but doesn't that seem to kind of counteract the whole point of spending a semester overseas? When I was first considering the possibility of studying for my degree in a different country, I kept encountering the major emphasis on the "become immersed in a different culture; experience what life is like from a deeper aspect; spend time in a country as more than just a tourist" side of things.
It just seems counter-productive to me to be forever surrounded by your fellow Americans, constantly complaining about how ketchup is referred to as tomato sauce here, or that hotels should be hotels like back home with beds and little restaurants instead of being bars or pubs.
A little remind: you're not "home!" And, while we may refer to that red stuff that comes in a Heinz bottle as "ketchup" in the US, that doesn't mean that every country is required to call it "ketchup" as well. Besides, when you think about it, "tomato sauce" actually makes more sense.
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I love my country, and I'm more proud than you can imagine to be an American. I'm a huge supporter of our military, our hard-earned freedom, and everything that we have the privelege to have as a nation.
But, seriously: can we please stop being so arrogant as to assume that every country we visit or spend time in should (aside from a few very noticable and "exciting" difference such as language, building structure, or history) "feel more American."
Where'd be the fun in that? If that's your idea of traveling, you could always just go to Pennsylvania and spend a bit of time with the Amish. That way, you can stay in your own country (surrounded by your comfort foods and conveniences) and still experience a different "culture" and language! Two birds with one stone.

Thursday, 21 May 2009

"Put Your Records On" and "It's ALIIIIIVE!"
It's "Loud Shirt Day," today. Loud Shirt Day is an initiative of "Deaf Kids Talking" here in Australia, who's primary focus is to support deaf and hearing impaired children throughout the country so they can learn to speak, hear, and listen.
Weerona's participation in this event is to host a Loud Shirt Day "Karaoke Night" over at TC (the tennis club) next door - the college has rented out the upstairs level of the club for Weeronians and has arranged for each floor of each block to participate in a Sing-Off competition. They're asking for a gold coin donation at the door (that's either $1 or $2 dollars, depending on which gold coin you use) which will go to the Deaf Kids Talking organization.
Imagine 215 uni students wearing the brightest, flashiest, and (clearly by default) the ugliest shirts you've ever seen, crammed into one room and an outdoors terrace belting out old 80's hits and current chart-toppers and you'll get a pretty clear image of what my night is going to be like. :D
Do I take this opportunity to point out that, as I am an international student and had extremely limited luggage space available to me, I neglected to bring any incredibly vibrant T-shirts with me? Probably not. ;)
- It's Aliiiiive!
  If you're wondering at all where I could possibly have disappeared to in the last few weeks and what thrilling adventures I've been up to during the abandonment of my blog, the answer is simple, and a definite let-down.
  I've been studying. Massive amounts of studying: Anatomy, Chemistry, Psychology, and Human Growth, Nutrition, and Exercise are remarkably demanding subjects, especially with final exams rapidly approaching.
  Anatomy, in particular, has been a major focus for me over the past weeks as 75% of my final grade depends on my final exam performance both on paper and in the lab. Fortunately, Dr. Gregg Peoples (my subject and degree coordinator) is a brilliant and really understanding professor who's arranged that, for the remainder of the session, we'll be put through several practice exams in the lab to help us prepare for the final practical exam (undoubtedly the most daunting of my upcoming exams).
  In what free time I've had, I've been...sleeping. Yup. Uber-productive! Nah, I'm still living with the marvelous effects of mononucleosis, so I'm in a pretty constant state of exhaustion, hence the ridiculous quantities of sleep.
  *****
  Winter's pretty much arrived, now. I officially had to wear my jacket for the first time the other night, on the way to Ryan and Kieran's play at Uni - a hoodie just couldn't quite handle the chill factor. Still, like Southern California. the days remain at relatively pleasant temperatures, usually requiring little more than long sleeves or a sweatshirt and (on the days that it isn't raining) the sunshine feels really intense which I love.
  The rain is something I'm not entirely used to. I can pretty much guarantee I've seen more rain in three months here than I've experienced in an entire year in SoCal. No wonder everything is so green here! LOL! Not that I particularly mind the rain - unless, of course, I'm walking to Uni when the heavens decide to be overly-generous to the handful of brown grass blades in Wollongong.
  In fact, I kind of like it: there's nothing quite like finishing studying for the day, making a cup of coffee, tea, or hot chocolate (depending on your personal preference), and sipping a hot cuppa with a group of friends in your dorm room, a friend's dorm room, or various common rooms (depending, again, on your personal preference.)
  *****
  By the way, I am now 100% OK with the fact that the traffic comes from the "wrong" direction, and on the "wrong" side of the road. (Note the quotation marks! I'm actually used to it!) I walk on the left side of the sidewalk, look to my right as opposed to my left before I cross the road, and I even walk to the left side of the car to get into the passenger seat. It's official. I'm pretty much over the whole "culture shock" thing. In fact, my slang vocabulary is increasingly dramatically and I've even been caught at increasing intervals to be speaking in an (apparently) accurate Aussie accent.
  Don't even try to imagine what it'll be like by the time I go home in November!