I'm in the middle of the last lap, guys. It is hard to believe I've been here since July, and it's almost over. I decided to stay an extra few weeks to hang out with my friends. Until then, though, I've got some take home exams to tackle. I just got my final trial out of the way today, but still have this stupid paper to do. You can see I can't go crazy just quite yet. I'll try to keep up with things over the next few weeks, but no guarantees.

Then again, what does it matter? I'm the only one that reads this anyway...:)

Okay...some of my Australian friends commented that much of this journal was nothing but "winging" (pronounced "winj-ing", it means complaining) about all the ways (and there are many) that Australia sucks. In honor of those friends, I decided to put together a little list of the things I think Australia does right. Don't worry, you won't be here long. It's a pretty short list.

1) The Half Flush--Australians tend to be a little more concious of the environment, I think. Most of the toilets here have a "half flush" to save water. You don't have to unleash all of the awesome power your toilet can muster, like when all it has to do is remove last nights six-pack, ya' know?

2) Serious about drunk driving--the legal limit here is .05...that's about one drink. Many of the kids I know seem pretty conscientious about picking a DD or taking a taxi when they get "pissed" (Australian for "drunk").

3) The Food--so many immigrants from so many countries means you can get great Italian, Thai, Chinese, Japanese, Malaysian, Greek, and on , and on.

4) Sports--the entire country is sports CRAZY!!! Now, Americans like sports, but here it is engrained in the national identity. Here, it is the norm that girls AND guys get into rugby. Both sexes will likely know their sport. Many of the commentary teams include women, but it's not a big deal like it is in the US. No one questions that the women know their stuff (they are also no where near as hot as the girls on US sports shows, but that's another story).

5) Reading--Australians love to read (the ones that can, anyway...OOOH, good one!) There are bookstores everywhere!!

6) Fat French Fries--This may seem trivial, but I assure you it is not. I have spent time in the french fry frying business so I know what I'm talking about. Fat fries not only have a better taste, texture, and consistency, but are also harder for the morons that cook them to mess up. That means I get great fries almost everywhere I go :)

There you have it folks! A few areas that Oz has their stuff together. Good On Ya', Australia!! (That's how they says "Job well done.")

Just posted broad strokes about my trip to Fraser Island a few weeks back...I back dated the post so things would be in order. Just scroll down to see them.

To those of you who have been trying to join Friendster because of that email I sent, keep trying! They've been having some problems lately due to all the people who are signing up.

Here's something I wrote a while back...just hadn't posted it yet...

There’s an Australian cricket player named Shane Warne who has been in the news lately. This guy is like the Dennis Rodman of cricket (if such a thing is possible) in that he is always getting in trouble (not because of his hair style or tattoos). His favorite seems to be getting accused of sexual harassment (and implicitly, adultery since he IS married with kids) by women all over the world. Seems Shane is fond of sending dirty text messages to women’s cell phones. He went through this whole public scandal last year, and now he’s going through the exact same thing. This time the woman is alleging a year long affair with Warren, and is going public because he refused to pay her to keep quiet (nice). (I’m totally ignoring the 3 other women who also came forward within 2 weeks of her announcement).

The funniest part was what one of his teammates said in support of Shane during a press conference. The guy basically said it was a shame that some “hairy-backed Sheila” (Aussie slang for girl) was doing this to him. When I heard him say that on the news I almost spit out my drink! Can you imagine Shaq coming out and calling the girl accusing Kobe Bryant of rape a “dog-faced skank”? Okay, maybe Shaq is a bad example. I can imagine him saying that. Still...calling a girl a "hairy-backed Sheila" is just too funny...

OK, gang...here's the deal. I'm about 3 weeks behind on this thing...my bad. The problem is that I have assignments due from now until the rest of the semester (YES, I still have to do schoolwork) so I won't have much time to spend on this. I'll try to do bits and pieces, but can't make any promises.

I just got back from a week-long trip to Fraser Island which was tons of fun. I hope to have it all down before I forget it all, but in the meantime, pictures will be up on Snapfish.com shortly.

Thanks for reading!

Final Day, Friday

We didn’t leave until later in the afternoon, so after a little more beach time a group of us rented scooters. I rented a little scooter/car looking thing that sat two people. Needless to say, we got a lot of stares cruising up and down the street.

We rolled back into Sydney at about 7:30 AM, a whole hour ahead of schedule. Ours was the first bus to come by so we didn’t have to spend an hour saying goodbye to everyone. That would have been annoying…

6th day, Thursday

Today we left the island and headed back home. We stopped off at the Australia Zoo, “home of the Crocodile Hunter!”. You know, Steve Irwin?...The guy who shouts “Crikey!” Anyway, he was actually there, but he wasn’t doing the croc show because he was doing some press conference with John Howard, Australia’s Prime Minister (like our president). I did get a glancing picture of him…the “Crikey” guy, not John Howard. I do have to say, our Secret Service agents are much better dressed than their Australian counterparts. We spent that night further down the coast in Surfer’s Paradise and had dinner at the Hard Rock Café there.

5th day, Wed

Lake Mckenzie is, without a doubt, the crown jewel of Fraser Island. It was unfortunate that we only got to spend an hour and a half there. It was beautiful! And fresh water!! The lake is filled entirely by rain water, and the sand can be used to exfoliate your skin, shine your gold and silver, even brush your teeth! I didn’t try that though 

In the afternoon, we went to Lake Wabby. I spent most of the day saying, “Wabbywabbywabby” because it’s just so darn fun. It was about 2 km to the lake, so it was a near 30 minute walk uphill in what looked like desert. The lake will be gone in about 40 years because the sand dunes are slowly filling it in.

September 29, 2003 3d Day, Monday

Third day was spent driving up to Hervey (pronounced “Harvey”…don’t ask me why) Bay, Queensland to catch the ferry to Fraser Island. Once we got to the World Heritage Listed Fraser Island (the largest sand island in the world, by the way), we spent the rest of the afternoon actually getting to the “resort”. We rode this charter bus with monster truck tires (spelled “tyres” here) through the rainforest and looked around a bit.


September 30, 2003 4th day, Tuesday

In retrospect, though enjoyable this day was probably the most disappointing day. We did a lot of walking and driving to places that were just nice. We did get to see humpbacked whales swimming off the coast at Indian Head, though. That was cool.

The most memorable thing that happened was the bus getting stuck in the sand on the beach. It hasn’t rained on the island in while so the sand was really soft (part of the reason we had to walk some places was because the bus couldn’t get through). We all (and by “all” I mean the guys, and by the “guys” I mean the ones that weren’t too wussy) got down and had to dig the sand out from underneath the wheels and push the bus. Digging of the sand worked well. I’m a little doubtful how much the pushing helped.