1st Weekend in Oz

As you may have guessed, the weekend hit here in Queensland so I haven’t gotten around to my blog for a few days! Sorry to those of you who I know were highly disappointed ;)

On Friday when I arrived at the school I was asked to wait because our supervisor from Morayfield East wanted to talk to me. I was pulled into her office because they had decided to move me to a different classroom. Obviously from what I described in my last post that classroom would have been a lot to handle. Sandra (our supervisor) told me they didn’t think it would be fair to me to have my lessons interrupted as much as they would be and that
they wanted me to have a better experience.

So, I was moved next door to Miss Kylie Cooke. She is in her second year of teaching, but I can already tell that she and I hold a lot of the same beliefs when it comes to building relationships with our students. I was most disappointed about switching classrooms because I thought well if this teacher is having a hard year, why don’t you let me help her as much as I can? It always makes a huge difference just having another set of eyes and hands in a classroom.

Anyway, in my new classroom, still Year 6, the kids are absolutely wonderful. Miss Cooke and the kids all say they love my accent. Haha. The first full day in the classroom seemed to be endless though, because I didn’t know the schedule. Unfortunately, Aussie schools hardly seem to follow
any type of schedule. Every day is different for them. Kind of drives me crazy and throws me off. I believe I will be teaching my first lesson this Wednesday so hopefully that will go well.
Friday evening eight of us met up at Kim and Jordyn’s for some champagne and “nibbles.” We were only there for a couple of hours because some of us were pretty tired from our long day in the classroom.

We had a nice relaxed morning getting ready for the BBQ at Sutton’s Beach. A few QUT students picked us up to take us there since our host family works on the weekends. It was nice to get to have some conversations with QUT students who are also studying to be teachers in an off campus setting. The beach was gorgeous! However, the QUT students were telling us that this was hardly a beach and that they would take us to a real beach while we were here. The one we were at was more of an area where families go for birthday parties or gatherings to have a BBQ (hence the reason we were there). A lot of us girls got some funky pink tan lines going on. I happen to have one foot burn, not too sure how that happened.

On our way home from the beach the QUT students took us on a wild kanagroo chase!! Okay, maybe I should be a bit more honest. The students drove us to a residential development where there use to be “bush” or what we would call a “field with a lot of trees and grass.” So there was a golf course, houses, a nice walking trail where kids rode their bikes, and then some kangaroos. They parked the cars and we got closer to the kangaroos than you would get to a squirrel or deer. They were such calm animals. I can’t wait to go to a zoo so I can feed them and scratch their tummies! Haha.

After that, we returned home to rest and recuperate before we headed off to downtown Brizzy (Brisbane). Ironic enough, this weekend they are working on the trains, so we had to take a bus from the train station to a train station about 30 minutes away to catch a train to the city.
One funny thing that happened while we were riding the train was all of a sudden we came to a train crossing where the blocks were down so traffic couldn’t go through. Which was funny because the trains weren’t running, so why would the blocks be down? So our driver radioed a few people and then asked cars behind him to back up so he could reverse and go another way.

Finally, we caught a train and off to the city we went. First we went to South Bank. The pubs in this area were more relaxed, laid back, not so loud music, more of a place you would go to sit around and talk with close friends. Then we moved to the area of downtown that’s called “The Valley.” From the sound of “South Bank” and “The Valley” you might imagine the two places
were like two different worlds. The music, the pub décor, the atmosphere, and the people couldn’t be more different. The Valley was definitely a clubbin’ type atmosphere, girls wore less and less, boys rocked their own style too. The music was loud and fun and everyone was dancing. Being our first Saturday night out in Australia – we were ready to dance! And no worries friends, Australia had plenty of Malibu Cokes waiting for me! We stayed there until about 12:30
before we headed out to catch the trains and busses back to Morayfield.

Pokies – as in poker a machines or slot machines as we would call them
Bucks or stag/hens parties – bachelor/bachelorette parties

So I have this little philosophy on round abouts that I would like to share with you. If you don’t know what a “round about” is, go google image it. So Australia does not have stop signs. They have stop lights and “give way” signs, but not stop signs at intersections or anything. Instead, when two major roads meet, they have a round about. Now, this makes for a very swiveled
ride in a car. You are always swerving or going in a circle. It’s weird. We Americans find it annoying to ride in cars around town here because it’s a rougher ride than we are used to. (Plus you have to realize there are a lot more cars here that are manual than cars that are automatic. Thus adding to the jerky car rides.) Anyways! I understand the use of round abouts. It keeps traffic moving, I mean really you hardly ever come to a complete stop while you are driving here
unless you are at a stop light. It would be hard to have stop signs with as much traffic as they have here. However, this amount of round abouts would never work in Minnesota or South Dakota. Want to know why? Come on, guess. Because we have icy roads! Can you imagine driving in circles like that and yielding for others while traffic just doesn’t stop moving? Where would they even begin to put the salt on the roads?! Ha, anyway – this is me sharing my thoughts with you from when I was trying to pass the time in the bumpy car rides.

Take care, friends! Love and hugs to you all. I miss you!!!