July 17, 2003
Slow day. Got bank accounts, we all called home. They had a little thing for us international students. Met MY Aussie mate, Angela. The girls are making me share her. As soon as she said she like to shop, I knew she was my Aussie mate in name only. Simon and Shereen in the exchange office are cool. Met a couple of folks, a few characters. It will be interesting to see what the law folks are like.

I’m really hoping I stay up past 10PM tonight. Hey, don’t laugh. It will be harder than it sounds. Our bodies can slowly adjust to the seasons, but doesn’t do so well when the sun sets at 8:30 PM one day and 5:30 the next. 8PM feels like 11PM.

We’re moving in on Saturday! With a perfect script written by me and perfect execution by Leslie we were able to get Sean to pick us up from the Randwick, including Ana’s luggage! This was a big deal for us. By this point, though things hadn’t been going bad, we were still very grateful for small victories like this. Michelle called and said they needed the deposit tomorrow. We thought that was a bit weird, especially since we were moving in Saturday. We ended up just writing up a receipt and hoping for the best.

The news updates for one of the channels has the same bumper music as the NBC Nightly News…weird. Another station has the same slogan and very similar opening video as ABC. They only have, like, 4 broadcast stations here. Apparently, they only got cable TV eight years ago. And it is all subsidized by the government…strange.

The birds here don’t “sing.” They yell and scream like old men arguing about politics or children fighting over a toy. It is quite disconcerting.