Harbo(u)r City Adventures

Wow, so this seems like forever ago, but on the weekend of May 18 I went to Sydney with Lauren V and Litsa.

I should take this moment to identify all the players in this game: Lauren V is not my roommate Lauren, but she essentially is because her room is literally in the dungeon of our building and has no natural light, leading her to spend most of her time with roommate Lauren, Theresa and me in our apartment. Litsa, meanwhile, is awesomely Greek American, and her whole name is Evagalia Something Greek Georgakilas. We bond over ethnicity, unexpected nicknames, and halva.

So, Sydney: Lauren and I stayed with Amanda, a friend of Lauren's from high school who is studying at McQuarie University in Sydney, and Litsa stayed with a friend from home who is also abroad there. Our flight was absurdly early so that when we made it to Sydney we had a bunch of time to explore but very little energy to do it. A week and a half later its all sort of a blur, so I can't really tell you what I did when, but here are some of the highlights of my weekend:

We always ended up at the harbor at dusk, without fail. I tried to get there during the day to take good pictures, but even then it was overcast and cloudy so it just ended up looking like dusk anyway. Don't worry, though: Sydney is beautiful in any light, as hopefully this photo of the bridge proves.


Okay, so here is the deal: I love the Opera House. It is freaking awesome in all its strange, turtle-y fluidity. I love that it's white, I love that it looks like it could just stand up on one hundred little legs and scuttle off like a crab into the water, and I love its unrepentent modernity. What I don't love is its inability to fit into a regular camera lens unless said camera is eight trillion feet away. The buiding is just too freaking big. This was the closest I could get and still capture the whole building:


One night after dinner we wandered around town, waiting to meet some of Litsa's friends. We had agreed to find them at City Hall, which seemed like a good idea at the time. When we got there, however, it quickly became apparent that there was no way we could locate anyone in the crowd gathered around the building. Why? Because there were scores of people standing stupidly watching a woman throw burning sticks into the air. City Hall was festooned with chinese lanterns and red cloth, and the fire-lady was dressed in an abbreviated ceremonial dress. Here she is:


The crowd grew larger once the dragon-dancers came, wearing their enormous dragon costumes and playing head-achingly-loud cymbals. The colors and lights were fantastic, though. This was all clearly the lead-up for some sort of event happening at the hall, and our wait was rewarded when people in tuxes and gowns started arriving. The highlight of the evening, however, was when a veritable cadre of red motercycles sped up onto the sidewalk and faced off against the dragon-dancers while the passengers sitting side-saddle on the hogs got off, dusted off their evening wear, and swept into the hall. It was quite possibly the most perposterous moment I've ever witnessed, but unfortunately none of my pictures came out well. Sidenote: the event was not a fundraiser for a Chinese charitable foundation, as I had been guessing, but rather something called "Spark of Genius," which is a fundraiser for a schizophrenia foundation. I'm not sure where the Chinese theme comes in - maybe the dragons fighting the motorcycles while fire-bombs go off around them are all meant to symoblize what its like inside the brain of someone suffering from schizophrenia?

You can't do Sydney without a visit to a beach, so on Sunday we took the ferry out to Manly Beach. We chose Manly over Bondi because a) Bondi was going to be insanely crowded and b) we see Bondi Beach every week when we watch Bondi Rescue, a reality tv show version of Baywatch. In one episide a lifeguard saved a Polish surfer who got all huffy, insisting that he was a trained lifeguard in Poland who was an expert in judging ocean tides - it made for amazing viewing. But anyway, Manly. The ferry ride there was great - we were able to see the whole harbor from the boat. We also got mixed up in a boat race, as seen here from afar:


At some points we were a lot closer to the boats, so much so that we started cheering for one when they turned and waved at us. Some of the boats were sponsored by companies, and the funniest sight of the day was watching as the Yellowtail Wine boat practically capsized because they were tilted too low and their sail caught water. All of us on the deck of the ferry were yelling for them to tighten their sail up and get back in the race but they were just milling around or laying out on the stern, totally unconcerned that their boat was about to flip. I think its because their sponsors paid them in product rather than actual money, so they were three sheets to the wind by that leg of the race.

Manly is a beautiful beach with a lovely waterfront town attached, which we walked through. My favorite part of the town center is the fabulous sandwhich shop where I built what I think is the most amazing sandwhich ever: roasted eggplant, sundried tomatoes, cheese, lettuce, pickles and onions on a baguette with balsamic vinagrette dressing. So simple, but something about that place made it fabulous. I tried to recreate the experience back in my apartment but it just wasn't the same. So if you are ever in Manly Beach, go to the Manly Deli and get that. You'll thank me.

We sat around on the sand, eating our sandwhichs and making all the usual small-talk that happens at the beach ("oh, what lovely water, the sand is so nice, I think I'm burning to a crisp, yay skin cancer, what is that girl wearing, who does she think she is, oh my goodness sir, please put your swim trunks back on!") when a little boy ran up and kicked his soccer ball towards us. Now, Lauren V. and Amanda are friends from high school, where they were on the soccer team together. They both get up and start playing with the boy, who was five years old, British, and suprisingly adept at soccer. Here they are:


Our trip also included countless outings to the Paddington Market and the Market on the Rocks. The Rocks, in fact, was were we spent a lot of our time - a charming, if touristy neighborhood of Sydney filled with old buildings and nice bakeries, it abutted the harbor bridge and was a lovely area to wander through in the evening. While hovering around the harbor one afternoon we saw seven wedding parties in full celebratory regalia, so clearly its a popular destination. A couple of times I accidently wandered into a married-couple photo shoot under the bridge or bracketed against the harbor, and then I felt like a huge jerk.

We usually ended our days watching the sun set over the harbor, so I'll finish this post with a picture of Litsa and me outside the Opera House. We were waiting for the Opera House tour to start, and I can assure you that if you are ever in Sydney and have neither the time nor the budget to catch a show there you should definitely go on the tour. It is an amazing, weird, slightly ugly yet fascinating building and it will make the inner theater dork in you jump up and down like a little girl.

Litsa is covering her face with an article she had to read for class, but thats her trademarked hair-bump over the paper (Litsa is interrupting me to inform you that the technical name for her hair-bump is a bouf, and she doesn't appreciate my lack of respect for the title):


So that was Sydney, minus the huge amounts of food I consumed and the ridiculous sums of money I spent on sightseeing, snacks, and drinks. Next up: Great Ocean Road!

Dulce et Decorum Est

Wednesday, April 25 was Anzac Day, which means two things: classes were canceled and the country was overridden by men in uniforms. Oh, and a third thing: lots and lots of bagpipes.

Anzac Day was born at the end of World War I, Australia's first big military undertaking since Federation in 1901. Australia was still a member of the British Commonwealth, so WWI saw Australians fighting under the British flag. The day was originally made into a public holiday to commemorate the battle at Gallipoli, where the Australian and New Zealand imperial forces were absolutely decimated by the Turks. "Anzac" stands for "Australia New Zealand Army Corps" and is also what the soldiers were called. Since the vetrans of World War II returned from all over the South Pacific, however, Anzac Day has come to be understood as a day to remember the soldiers who fought in all the wars Australia participated in.

Commemorating defeat with a national holiday is a peculiarly Australian thing to do. The arguement is that its not about the fact that they lost, but rather that they tried. The world, or at least the British Empire, thought of Australia as a backwater colony. The war was an opportunity to prove their worth as a young nation, and despite their utter failure at Gallipoli, there was a feeling that they had. They tried their damnedest, and thats all that mattered for them. What came out Gallipoli and was enshrined in the first Anzac Day was the image of the Australian soldier as brave, unflinching, blunt, and ready for anything. The diggers (slang for soldier) were the Everymen of Australia, capable and fearless, and the ritual of Anzac Day is about labeling those characteristics as distinctly Australian in nature. What is strange about the Anzac legend is that the ideal Anzac (and thus Australian) was put forward as honest, hard-working, hard-drinking, and cynical. In many of the stories written in the Anzac Book, a war-time souvenir that became the basis for the legend, the hero is opposed to the war and only goes because of his loyalty to his friends. There is a strong sense of anti-authority that runs through the Anzac legend, which highlights the irony of the way the state idolizes the Anzac soldier.

But anyway: Anzac Day. The holiday, which has been celebrated every year since Gallipoli, begins with a dawn service. The services usually take place at the various communities' war memorials. Interesting side note: Australia has more war memorials per capita than any other country. Back on track: thirty years ago, with the World War I vets dying and the World War II vets getting increasingly older, attendance at dawn services were down and pundits and lawmakers were spelling the end of Anzac Day. The last fifteen years has seen a dramatic rise in attendance, however, as young Australians find reasons to connect with the holiday. No one is quite sure why, but my friends and I theorized as we watched the pre-Anzac coverage on tv the week leading up to it. Modern nations define themselves through very specific events, often ones that are tumultuous and difficult. Look at America: we only became "Americans" once we made the violent split from Britain in 1776. More subtle but perhaps even more defining, people didn't begin referring to America colloquially as a "nation" until the Civil War. Before we were commonly called a "union," implying a loose confederacy of states voluntarily joining together. The turning point was the Civil War. In his first inauguration speech Lincoln used the word "union" twenty times and never once said "nation." The Gettysburg address, which is only 268 words long, includes "nation" five times and avoids "union" all together. The Revolutionary War made us a country, but the Civil War made us a nation.

All of this is to say that Australia didn't have a defining moment. The British had learned from the American debacle and gradually granted Australia increased autonomy until they were permitted to declare federation in 1901. They had a history of almost engaging in conflict—the 1850s saw a narrowly-averted rebellion centered around the gold rush, the 1880s had a disaffected and mistreated working class coming close to class warfare, and so on and so forth. Australia's history is one of carefully avoided violent encounters, which makes World War I and Gallipoli such a watershed moment. For people searching for a way to define their nationhood, especially in a climate of multicultralism when it seems that anyone can be Australian, this moment of extreme bravery is an opportunity to vocalize "true" Australian qualities. This is just my cynical interpretation, however. One very smart friend pointed out that it MIGHT just be that young Australians happen to be interested in memorializing those who died for their country. I mean, just possibly.

Okay, lecture over, back to the Anzac Day account. The dawn service in Melbourne is held at the Shrine of Rememberence, Australia's largest war memorial and a behemoth of a building. I'm not sure how to describe its architecture style. It has some obvious Roman influences but it doesn't have the smooth elegance of America's neo-classical buildings and monuments. Instead it comes off as this enormous, jutting chunk of rock that dominates the Botanical Gardens, where it stands. Its a very powerful, very masterful building. My class on museum philosophy was cancelled and we were told instead to attend a service, so I pulled myself out of bed at 4:30 in order to catch a tram at 5:00 to make it down to the gardens by 5:30, which is when people were told to show up. It didn't start until 5:45, when the sun began to rise, but so many people were coming that you had to arrive at least fifteen minutes early to get a spot. Here I am right before I left my apartment, appalled that it is even possible to be awake at this hour:


The Botanical Gardens are on St. Kilda Road, past the river. To get there, I would in theory catch a tram on Swanston Street, where I live, and take it straight down until Swanston turned into St. Kilda Road. Unfortunuately, the tram website lied (damn MetLink) and no trams were running that early in the morning, so I found myself walking down Swanston at 5:00 AM, hurrying in the hopes of making it to the Shrine before the service started. Walking down the Australian equivalent of Broadway or Market Street in the pitch dark was quite an experience. There were three easily identifiable categories of people out at that hour: wasted hipsters only now leaving the bars and making their way back to their beds, homeless people, and worried-looking suburban couples who had come in on the trains and were braving their way through the inner city to make it to the service.

As we got closer to the Shrine, the experience grew more surreal. People started emerging from the side streets until there was a crowd of us walking in the dark. People who talked did so quietly, not wanting to disturb the sense of solemnity and calm. It was still pitch dark, mind you, so I'd occasionally hear a swear word or an exclamation as someone tripped on the pavement or barely avoided walking into a tree.

I followed the crowds up the hill to the Shrine and pushed my way closer to the actual building. Because it was dark, I didn't really have a sense of the layout, but I was close enough to hear the speakers and see the entrance to the Shrine.

At 5;45 the service started, and to be honest I don't remember most of it. There were the usual inspirational speeches about the courage it takes to die for your country and waste of young lives lost to war. I can never decide how I feel about these sort of events. On the one hand, everything they are saying about loss and mourning are true. It is horrible that young men and women go out and die before their time. It is tragic that families emerge from war ravaged and forever incomplete. And there are times, I believe, when war is unavoidable and necessary. When not fighting is worse than fighting. But it makes me angry to witness these large, grand events organized around the loss of life, because while 30,000 people might gather at the Shrine to mourn the loss of life, they also end up glorifying it. I hate how manipulated these events make me feel, with their carefully orchestrated torches and bugle playing, and the perfectly timed gunshots. The people who speak at events like this have to practice their speeches, over and over again, and the thought of someone repeating a line about young men crying out to God in the trenches in an attempt to get the emphasis just right, to recall the exact right emotion from the audience, makes me a little sick.

Because I was torn about the rhetoric employed at the service, I ended up tuning out what they were saying and focusing more on peoples' reactions. They were silent, still, for the whole thirty minute service. When the program started it was still impossible to see anything around you, so it was a bizarre feeling to suddenly become aware of your surroundings as the sun rose. I watched people blink and make eye contact for the first time, realizing suddenly that they had been standing a foot away from a total stranger for the last thirty minutes.
Here is the shrine right before the gunfire salute, as the light was just beginning to touch the building and people were emerging from their own private headspaces:

And here is a blurry shot of the Shrine at the end of the service, as we all watched the Lord Mayor and Premier of Victoria climb the stairs and lay wreaths at the center of the Shrine:

Now do you see what I mean about a weirdly intimidating pagan temple?

The actual service is extraodinarily short and is followed by something called "the gunfire breakfast." The armed services association, called the Royal Serviceman's League (RSL) sponsors a big breakfast cookout. We all queued up in front of army tents outfited with stoves and burner while servicemen and women served eggs, toast, and bacon. By the time I got to the breakfast the line was already a couple hundred people long, and so when I made it to the tea and coffee station, which is only half-way to the food station, I grabbed my mug of tea and four Anzac biscuits and hightailed it out of there.

Sidebar on Anzac biscuits: supposedly the food of choice for embattled Australian trench soldiers, Anzac biscuits are possibly the second-best thing to come out Australia since forever (the first best thing being the Tim Tam. And yes, all my Australian-loves are food-related, is that a problem?) They are crunchy, oaty, buttery, brown-sugary goodness and I love that a) a national holiday REQUIRES that they be consumed, and b) they were essentially being shoved down my throat by soldiers at 7 AM, and this is somehow not considered utterly bizarre by the people of this fair nation. I now return you to your regular broadcast.

Because I am inexplicably obsessed with this building, here is another shot of the shrine as I waited for a tram on the road outside of the Botanical Gardens. If the building is boring you, please note the large numbers of people streaming out of the park. It is 7 AM and they all woke up three hours ago to make it for a thirty minute state service. Thats some crazy dedication, folks. Also, they probably didn't stuff their pockets full of Anzac biscuits like a certain American co-ed, so they really are suffering.


As I walked up St. Kilda Road towards the river (after waiting in vain for a tram to come) I saw this young man and his father.

He's interesting not just because, hey, look at that, dude wearing an Australian flag, but because apparently, Australians don't do this. In one of my less riveting classes, Australia Now, we talked earlier in the semester about how Australia isn't a very patriotic country, at least not in the way Americans are used to thinking of the term. The populist, ground-swell shows of support that are so prevalent in America - flags on porches, bumper stickers, gaudy t-shirts and baseball caps - aren't part of the Australian landscape of representations of nationhood. Or, at least, they weren't. Recently, however, there have been more and more cases of Australians, usually young people, making blatantly patriotic fashion statements such as this. Its so suprising and new that pundits and politicians have made a big deal out it, writing articles and giving speeches about this nascent form of Australian national pride. The discussions about this all revolve around a single issue, though: is this an organic movement concerned with inspiring a love for Australia through its symbols of nationhood, or is it further proof of the "Americanization" of Australia, that even their expressions of patriotism have to be borrowed from the US? I don't know what the answer is, but what I find most interesting about this whole "wearing your patriotism" debate is that the people who are wearing the Australian flags are usually tattooed, peirced, hip young types. That sort of national pride would never come from edgy urban youth in America, which makes the situation here all the more complicated, and, I think, more organic.

I made my way over the river onto Swanston Street, stopping at the crosswalk in front of the Flinders Street Station (my favorite building in Melbourne!). As I waited for the light to change, I spotted this man and quickly snapped a photo of him:


I really don't know what to make of him, but I'll explain what I do know: the flag he's wearing is the Aboriginal flag, designed in 1971 as a rallying symbol for the wide and varied Aboriginal tribes to unite behind in their fight for civil rights. Here's where it gets complicated, though: one of the reasons people think Anzac Day has become so popular in recent years is because of the political and historical complications of the other huge national holiday, Australia Day. Australia Day commemorates the landing of the First Fleet, commanded by Captain Arthur Phillip, which put into port at Sydney Cove and set up the Colony of New South Wales on January, 26, 1778. Historically celebrated widely throughout the country, by the mid-20th century Aboriginal Australians and those sympathetic to their history began to criticize Australia Day for celebrating an event that, for the indigenous people, marked the beginning of the end of their way of life. Many people referred to Australia Day as Invasion Day or Survival Day and marked it as a day of mourning. The debate around the national holiday went on for such a long time that people began to look for another way to commemorate their nationhood. This disillusionment with Australia Day contributed to some degree to the popularity that Anzac Day is now experiencing. Australia Day is still a large holiday, but the Australians I've talked to don't see it as their defining historical moment.

But just as Australia Day is exclusive, so is Anzac Day. The people Anzac Day commemorates, the soldiers in the two World Wars and Vietnam, were by and large Anglo male Australians. It is inherently an exclusive holiday, celebrating the contributions of one group of people without making mention of the women and indigenous people who weren't allowed to fight for Australia or of the countless immigrants who come from the very countries Australia was at war with. The man wearing the Aboriginal flag was also carrying a bottle of whiskey, stumbling around talking to himself, and looked a little worse of wear, so I have no way of knowing his motivations for wearing the flag. Still, I think he is an important symbol, one that shows that the problems raised by Australia Day—the issues of who shapes national history and whose story is privileged over others'—don't disappear just because the primary national holiday has changed.

But back to the Anzac proceedings: As I trudged my way back up to my apartment, the bars around me began to fill with people. It was still only 7:30 in the morning but that didn't stop those returning from the dawn service. Anzac Day is about a lot of things: that quinessential Australian ideal of "mateship," queen and country, war; but its also about drinking a lot, for a large portion of the day. I had a feeling that many of the people I saw pouring into the pubs were planning on grabbing a pint, finding themselves a seat at the bar or a spot of wall to lean against, and not leaving until they were kicked out by managment at midnight. I however, had a different plan: my four Anzac biscuits, while delicious, were not enough to sustain me, so I set out to find raisin toast and a cup of tea.

After my breakfast at a cafe (which took me FOREVER to find, because apparently there is some cosmic law that demands that for every bar and pub open in Melbourne a comparative number of cafes must be closed) I returned to Swanston Street intending to fall into bed until noon, only to find myself caught up in the crowds watching the annual Anzac Day Parade. It started a block above my aparment, so I got to witness rows upon rows of soldiers preparing to march their way down to the Shrine:


My favorite group was the bagpipe battilion, because I covet their kilts and tassled knee-socks:


But my absolute favorite person was an older gentleman who stood near the end of the parade, dressed in full World War I regalia with his sword raised the entire time. He had a thick pointed mustache and a bear-like build, and when I saw him I said the first thing that into my head, which was, "wow, he looks JUST like Kaiser Willhem!" Which was, of course, exactly the WRONG thing to say at a parade commemorating the Allied involvement in World War I, but oh well. We have the fabulous Berkeley public education system to thank for that little slip. Unfortunately my camera ran out of batteries right before I saw him, but believe me when I tell you he was a sight.

At the parade I ran into my friend Sarah, who had just woken up. She was planning on following the parade down to the Shrine, but I bowed out - two trips to the war memorial before 9 AM was more than I could handle. So we each went on our merry way: her to the Shrine, me to my bed.

The rest of the day was fun as well: my friend Danny organized an Anzac Day scavenger hunt that had us running around the city, snagging pictures with men in uniform, stealing memorabilia, kissing people, harassing football fans, and taking more shots than I care to remember at bars that I simply can't remember. It was a blast, but we didn't use my camera so (thankfully) I have no footage of it. I will tell you that we didn't win, but thats because the boys cheated and swam the Yarra River, a feat worth so many points that there is no way we could catch up. However, if we'd managed to get pretend-arrested, we would have beaten them hands-down. We were suprisingly close to it, too—Lauren and I had almost sweet-talked a cop into booking one of us before his supervisor found out.

So that was my Anzac Day, more than a month late. I apologize for the length, and the college essay quality to the writing, but I wanted to get these ideas down as much for myself as for you. I'm fascinated by the ways in which nations express their identity and choose moments that they feel define them, and how those moments are re-interpreted by each successive generation as something different. Also, I'm hoping that next April 25, when I'm chilling out at Emory and Australia is just a series of fond memories, I'll read this and remember what a bizarre, strange, fun day I had. Maybe I'll even rustle up some Anzac biscuits.

God's Own Earth

Monty Python has this great sketch called the Bruces. In it, a group of Australian philosophy professors are introduced to a visiting British colleague and confusion ensues as the Briton realizes that all the Australians are named Bruce. Moreover, they can't handle a complicated name like Michael, hate gay people, and drink more than they teach. Its not the prettiest Australian stereotype, but it is very amusing. At one point one of the Bruces yells at Michael: "I'd like to welcome the Pommy bastard to God's own earth and remind him that we don't take kindly to poofters!" All of this is to say that while the Bruces might think Australia is God's own earth, New Zealand begs to differ. And I have the documentary photographs to prove it.

I spent Easter break (can't call it spring break, as it assuredly isn't spring on this side of the world, but it isn't winter break either, and fall break has to many associations with long weekends at Emory, so the religious marking will have to do) in New Zealand, tooling around the South Island with friends Lauren (not my roommate Lauren, but an awesome Lauren, nonetheless), Ari (short for Arianne and pronounced "Air-ee") and Theresa in Kiwi, a rickety old car that we rented for a suspiciously small amount of money. Kiwi did her job, though, and took us all over the island. I don't want to bore you with the recital of what we did each and every day, because while sitting in the car for hours and watching mountains pass while listening to Kanye West was fun to do, it loses a little something in the retelling. I will try to keep this vaguely chronological, though. So get ready for the episode of my life that I call Shoshi Does New Zealand.

Our first real adventure was hiking on Fox Glacier. Fox is one of only three glaciers in the world in which is surrounded by a temperate rain forest. It was a bizarre experience to hike it—one moment we were sweating in a swealtering jungle, trying to get down to our last decent layers of clothing, and then suddenly we would emerge onto mountain of ice and scramble for sweatshirts.

Here I am before we started the hike—please take extra notice of my bangin' footwear. The company that ran our hike (you can't go onto the glacier without a guide) provided us with these awesome boots that looked like they belonged in some inspiring film about 1900's wilderness explorers. I felt very John Muir.



Here is the approach to Fox:



And here is a shot of the mountains behind the glacier, with lots of little people standing on the ice. This should convey to you the sheer size of the glacier. If it doesn't, take my word for it: it is big. I was very impressed. Cold, a little mucuous-y from my running nose (due to the aforementioned cold) and with my toes bleeding from the damn boots, but impressed.



Our hiking guide, Sam, was a very charming, very knowledgable guy who dorkily admitted that he was trying to memorize all the flora and fauna in the rainforest. He also carried an ice pick like a sword against his back and used to hack out steps for us on the glacier. Foolishly, Sam believed our clever disguise, took us for mature young adults who could be trusted to handle dangerous tools, and let Ari, Lauren, and me hold the pick. He soon regreted that decision, as I took the opportunity to go all Trotsky on Ari:



After Fox Glacier (ooh, which New Zealanders pronounce "glaes-ier" to my endless amusement, as well as "crev-ASS" for "crevass") Kiwi huffed and puffed her way to Queenstown. Lauren and Ari went skydiving, while Theresa and I kept our feet firmly planted topside. Later that same day, though, we all went canyon jumping, which is essentially bungy jumping in a harness from a higher height. We jumped from 109 meters, and it was quite possibly the most awesome thing ever. Here is a birds-eye shot of the canyon that doesn't do its height justice:



They have different types of swings you can do which correspond to different levels of scariness. I chose the pindrop, which basically means I had to stand at the edge with my hands behind my back, bend my knees, and jump off the platform sidways. It took me a while to get myself ready:



And here I am, mid-crouch, right before I do the stupidest thing in my life and fall off a cliff:



I dropped for about twenty seconds (probably the scariest twenty seconds of my life) before the cables kicked in and started swinging me over the canyon. The cables let you go pretty low, so for a moment I thought I might touch the river at the bottom. I swung back and forth for a few minutes, breathing really heavily and trying to remember how to move my fingers, thinking extraodinarly inane things like "I have to check my bank balance" in between gasps of "oh my god, oh my god, OH MY GOD." Eventually the cables changed again and suddenly I was being pulled back up to the platform. When I first stepped back onto the edge, my whole body started shaking. I know the guys asked me some questions but for the life of me I can't remember our conversation. Lauren, who took these pictures, said I looked like someone had just hit me over the head with a two-by-four, but personally I think I look like someone who just jumped off a cliff and fell for 109 FREAKING METERS. You be the judge:



We needed a day to come down from the skydiving/canyon swinging adreneline high, so the next day we took a leisurely ferry ride around Milford Sound, about four hours outside of Queenstown. Milford was astonishingly beautiful, and luckily the rain let up right around the time we got on the ferry. Here is one of the many gorgeous views we saw:



While in Queenstown the we took the opportunity to go white water rafting. Unfortunately, we chose a slot at 8:30 AM on the coldest day of our entire time in NZ. I'm not going to lie: there were some moments out there on the river that I was sure I would come back to Australia with my frozen toes amputated. Apparently my lips were a shade of blue previously unknown to man, but there aren't any pictures because I wasn't about to trust my camera to the mercy of the rocks and rushing water. For the geeks reading this, though, chew on this: the river we rafted on, the Kawarau, is also the Anduin. So that scene in the Fellowship, where they go on the river past those two huge statues—I rafted that! Only there weren't any statues and I was too busy concentrating on NOT FREEZING to pay much attention at the time. Still, I geeked out once I realized where I was. Also, a bridge that crosses the canyon is the original bunjy site, and as we went under it a girl jumped. It was cool to watch her plummet and then get caught up by the cord, but I'm not sure how much she enjoyed it—her shirt flew up, her face dropped into the water, and she got a bloody nose.

We left Queenstown and headed to Lake Tekapo, where we relaxed, came off our adrenaline highs, and generally frolicked. In fact, here we are, doing exactly that:



From Tekapo, we drove to Christchurch. We took the scenic route because a sweet old man stopped us in the middle of the road in a tiny town called Geraldine to suggest it to us. He saw us making a three-point turn in the middle of the street, hailed us down, and proceeded to give us directions, entirely unsought after. It was the strangest encounter, made all the more bizarre by the circumstances that had brought us to stop in Geraldine at all. We were originally going to breeze right past the one-horse town (a step-up from most New Zealand villages, which have to share one horse between three or four of them) when suddenly Kiwi blew a tire a couple kilometers out of town. She made it to the closest garage rolling on good luck and our fervent prayers. There was a sickening twenty minutes when it looked like our insurance wouldn't cover the repairs and we imagined the rest of our trip spent wandering the streets of Geraldine (all two of them). Once we got that straightened out, though, we spent a nice lunch at the local Subway before another group of travelling American co-eds came in and practically challenged us to a rumble. Apparently the town wasn't big enough for two American girl gangs, so we grabbed Kiwi and hightailed it out of there. That may seem like cowardice to you, but collegiate sweatshirts and Burberry headbands are a suprisingly intimidating combination. The one with the iron-straightened hair looked like she meant business, and I didn't want to see what the blond one could do with her Uggs.

ANYWAY, we took Nice Old Man's advice and took Highway 72. If you ever find yourself on the south island of New Zealand, you should also listen to Nice Old Man, because that was a some of the most beautiful highway I have ever seen. My favorite part was Rakaia Gorge—you don't really notice it at first, so you're just thinking, "oh, pretty landscape, pretty landscape, look at the sheep! Just like the other sheep! Pretty landscape, pretty landscape," and them bam, the gorge. Which, now that I think about it, is less "creeping" and more "bam, knocking into you," but whatever. Either way, it was stunning.



Christchurch was our last stop, and I'm not actually sure what to say about it. We were so hopped up from everything we'd done before—the hiking, the rafting, the jumping from high places—that we found it hard to get back into the groove of exploring a pretty city. I didn't take any good pictures of Christchurch (which is beautiful and definitely deserves more attention than it gets) because I was too busy trying to catch up on lost sleep or wandering around town, bitching about the crappy food (we made bad restaurant decisions) and damn birds (there are a lot of them). We did have AMAZING desserts and margaritas every night, though, so at least our days ended on a high note.

The highlight of Christchurch (beyond the desserts and the margaritas) and the part I enjoyed the best was the Antarctic Center. Christchurch is called the "gateway to Antarctica" and it is the city most used as a port of call for those stationed in Antarctica. The center is an interactive science exhibit, with informative videos, displays, and a room that recreates arctic conditions. They give you a parka and rubber shoes and let you go crazy on the ice. There is even an ice slide and a fake ice buggy, which I took full advantage off. Lauren was happy to ride piggyback:



The Antarctic Center also functions as a wildlife reserve for penguins who have been injured and are unable to live in the wild. They care for Little Blue penguins which are the smallest in the world. My favorite was Elvis, the bizarrely named blind female penguin. The caretakers feed all the penguins in the pool, but Elvis gets a special feeding on land because they can't trust her to catch her food in water. That didn't stop her from taking a dip after the feeding though, and watching her try to get back on the rocks was adorable. The observation room was filled with little girls going all Veruca Salt on their parents, squealing "Daddy, I want a penguin! Buy me THAT one! I WANT it!" I might have begged Lauren for one, to be honest.

Here is Elvis, cautiously approaching the pool. If someone of the Lipton-Resnikoff persuasion could find a way to get this to Grandma , I'd appreciate it: y'all know how that woman is about penguins.



And that, visually speaking at least, was that. I chose not to document the humiliatingly amusing night we spent sleeping in the airport before our plane started boarding, or the disgusting vending machine food I ate for dinner, midnight snack, or breakfast that day. I returned to Melbourne, exhausted but triumphant, ready to fall into bed and sleep for eight million years. And I did, which explains why I'm so late posting this.

Stay tuned for further Melbourne adventures, random pictures, and Sydney! (I just bought my ticket.)

P.S. If anyone is interested in meeting me in Thailand around the middle of June, email me.

Ask and Ye Shall Receive

So a certain brother of mine demanded an update and I'd hate to ruin his recent run of good fortune by denying him, so now you all get to benefit.

Now that the first week of classes has come and gone it has finally hit me that I actually have to go to SCHOOL here. Until now I'd just been wandering around the city, eating and wearing away my money and generally acting like my life was one extended vacation. Well, no more. The dark reality has hit - I have to do huge amounts of reading, write long papers, attend lectures; essentially, behave like a student. BOO. However, this chilling realization didn't stop me from going on a winery tour on Friday. A few American friends and I toured four wineries in the Yarra Valley, where a large number of Australian wines are made. I don't know that I learned much about wine, but I can definitely PRETEND to know what I'm taking about ("it has a light blonde color and a woodsy, full-bodied flavor with undertones of asparagus and old sweaters"), and I can certainly drink it with pleasure.



Before classes started I took the tram down to Acland St. in St. Kilda to see the Postcard Show at the Linden Gallery. They were displaying hundreds of submissions of small paintings, usually postcard-sized or slightly larger. Its a nice space - an old two-level mansion with wrought-iron railings and a lovely balcony. I liked some peices a lot, but they had so many it was difficult to make my way through them. Still, I enjoyed myself. I think my favorite part was when a woman brought in a large group of eight-year-old kids to show them the gallery. They wandered around in groups of three or four, freaking out about the art. A lot of them just thought the peices were ugly and had no problem expressing their dislike at the top of their lungs, but a couple of the girls really couldn't stand all the nudity. My favorite was this little blond girl who kept shrieking, "how can they show that! Those are her private parts! You can't paint private parts!" It took me a few tries, but I managed to snap a picture of them without looking like a stalker.



My classes are all engaging and don't seem to involve TOO much work, which is a relief. American Politics and Society, however, is proving to be interesting. At first I was concerned that the professor would be boring (his voice sort of lulls me to sleep), but not to worry - the way he represents American democracy is more than enough to keep me alert. Its not that he says anything extraordinarily outrageous, but he makes statements that just feel off. I can't totally pinpoint why, though, because I don't have the breadth of knowledge or factual information like he does—all I have is my anecdotal experience.

He criticizes the constitution and the American governing process a lot, and while his opinion is certainly legitimate, I wonder at the point of doing that in a class where the majority of the students know very little about the system he is judging. Its important to point out flaws in the system, but when the people you're showing the flaws to don't even know how the system is put together, it seems like you're showing them an innacurate view of that system. He makes weird comments too—he said that in the parliamentary system, the fact that you elect the party means that your leader is guaranteed to have experience by dint of having fought his way to the top of the party. In America, however, you can (and often do) elect leaders based on their ability to campaign and not on the basis of their experience. He was obviously refering to Bush, and he's right that Bush didn't have experience. However, when he refered to Australian party leaders, he made an aside about a couple of poor leaders they had elected and awknowledged that he was making a generalization, but still felt that generally speaking, Australia had elected solid leaders. He was obviously generalizing about America as well, but didn't mention that, or any other shoddy presidents we'd had. So the whole point of his argument was to show that Bush wasn't a strong leader with experience, but in making that point he also made a sweeping claim about the American election process (that we tend to not elect experienced leaders) and didn't back it up.

He made a lot of comparisons between the Australian and American governing systems, with America usually losing out. At one point he even said that Bush was inexperienced because the governorship of Texas was largely ceremonial and had very little hands-on action involved. Now, I am the first person to say that Bush administration has NOT been good to my country, but I find it hard to believe that the position of governor in the LARGEST state in the union is an empty honor. In fact, I know Texans who probably wish Bush's position had been ceremonial, given what how he lead the state. The class should really be called, "Why The American Constitutional System Doesn't Work and Isn't As Awesome As the Australian System, So There!"

Okay, so I know it sounds like I hate the class, but don't. When the professor isn't weirding me out with his out-of-left-field comments, he's actually quite informative, and I like hearing the reactions from the Australian students as well as their random questions about Hilary Clinton's chances or Barak Obama's "blackness." (Don't ask.) The professor is also witty in a dry sort of way and always willing to answer questions or open up the class for discussion, so all and all it really isn't that bad. Also, this is only the second week—I think as we get further into the course we'll be able to stop comparing the systems and just examine American politics on its own merit.

I leave you with a random picture from the adventure that Theresa and I went on to that amazing Swedish land known as Ikea. We needed apartment stuff (pots, pans, decorations, sheets) and the Swedes were happy to oblige. Of course, then I got caught up in the kids section and it all went south. Theresa had to drag me out before I bought a bright red pup-tent.

She doesn't call, she doesn't write

But she does update this abomination every once in a while. Due to popular demand (re: the mother's excellent nagging skills), I have gotten my act together and loaded more pictures onto my computer, which means that its time for another round of Amateur Photographer: Melbourne! These are sort of a mish-mash of stuff—places I've explored recently, plus some older photos that I'm throwing in because they prove that I am both actually in this country and that I have friends.

Rewinding a bit back to orientation, I give you the red cliffs of Noosa. If the Sunshine Coast is the bastard child of Santa Barbara and Sedona AZ, then this part definitely takes after the latter. I kept getting flashbacks to Tehiyah's 8th grade trip to Arizona, which was unexpected. Still, beyond the very red, very bright, very clothing-staining rocks is the entire Coral Sea, so its not such a bad deal.

Not only did I go to the beach, but I even swam. Theresa (roommate number 1) and I communed with the trees at Lake MacKenzie. We also both made valiant attempts at appearing effortlessly wind-tossled and cinematic, but I don't think it worked.





We took a nighttime trip around the city a couple days ago, so I give you Melbourne at night. I took this from the main bridge that crosses the Yarra River. The Yarra winds its way through the city, effectively dividing it into two sections. The photo is of the north side of the river, which is the side I live on. I haven't explored south of the river as much as I would have liked, because the university as well as the museums are on the north side.



Another picture of me. This one was taken by Theresa on Acland Street in St. Kilda. We've been here for THREE WEEKS and yet classes haven't even started yet, so I've had a lot of free time on my hands. I've taken to hopping on the tram and riding it as far as I can, getting off when I see something interesting. This picture was taken in the middle of one of those adventures—Theresa and I got off the tram in St, Kilda, got lost in a residential neighborhood, got hit by water balloons (whatever) and then tried to buy iced coffee at a cafe on Acland Street. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as ICED COFFEE in Australia. Seriously, you order iced coffee and they bring you this disgusting coffee, milk, ice cream concoction served in a sundae cup. Its overly sweet, slightly syrupy, and costs five dollars. The one time I asked for an iced coffee without the ice cream, the waitress looked at me quizzically and asked, "and why would you want that, love? Whats the point of the iced coffee without the ice cream?" As if that question could possibly make any sense.

Theresa, Lauren (roommate 2), and other girls from my program and I went to Brighton Beach last week, where I took this picture. Brighton has these little boxes lining the beach. Families own or rent them, and when we were there we saw people holding cookouts out of them.




This was one of my favorites—patriotism is the perfect beach acessory.

Alright, so thats it for now. Classes start for real tomorrow, which should be interesting. I only have American Politics and Society on Monday, but I'm looking forward to learning the Australian view of American democracy. I have been warned by many well-meaning people to not take offense, which means it should be exciting.

hah! the interwebs are no match for me!

I am all that is awesome. And by that I mean that after a week of being shunted from reception desk to help desk to IT and back to reception, I have finally managed to prove that I am a real person (IT was doubting it), that I truly am renting an apartment in my building (reception wasn't sure), and that the problem with my internet wasn't that I couldn't spell my own password (which was the only suggestion the help desk could give me.) In short, I have internet.

And so, without further ado, I give you Shoshi's First Week and a Half Down Under, The Picture Edition:

Orientation was like any sort of large group gathering of strangers, with kids shuffling around and repeating their name, home school, and major over and over again like they were the answers to a pop quiz. Still, I had fun, especially because we were housed in this strange little resort in the beach area of Noosa. It was all very out-doorsy and wildlife-y, which meant a) a lecture about all the various creatures that could poison, attack, eat, or otherwise harm us (a lot) and b) kangaroos!


We took the time to hang out at the beach, surf at the beach, sleep at the beach, eat at the beach, etc. An awful lot of beach time for someone who hates sand, but I actually found myself won over by the amazing location. The best beach-ing by far was on our day trip to Fraser Island. We stopped for lunch and a swim at Lake Mackenzie (after driving our huge tour buses through the undergrowth, over rocks, and even into the surf for hours on end) and were informed that the sand has such a high precentage of silicone in it that you can actually polish your teeth with it. Which we did, of course, but unfortunately I didn't think to document the moment. Still, here is Lake Mackenzie in all its glory.

After that there was a lot of stress involving moving in and buying things, both of which I'd rather not revisit except to say that all buildings that are meant to hold copious numbers of students should be obligated to have doors that stay open for more than ONE FREAKING SECOND. The suitcases aren't going to push themselves, you know. Since then my roommates and I have been exploring the city, seeing the sites, eating a LOT (we've taken to calling our study abroad experience the Gastronomical Tour of Melbourne) and generally hanging out. There are a lot of kids on my program and because the campus is basically empty we've found ourselves hanging out together more often than we should. We travel in packs of ten to twenty kids, entering small cafes and bars and generally taking them over with our loud American-ness. Its pretty amusing, but I'm hoping that as classes start I'll have the chance to get to know other people, preferably ones who don't sound like me.

One place in particular that I took a liking too during all this site-seeing was the Queen Victoria Market. A huge open market, it has what seems like a trillion stalls. It goes on forever - it stretches over almost an entire city block. There are four sections: the fresh produce section, which is something out of a Berkeley Bowl employee's wildest dream, the meat and cheese section (pretty much useless to me, but very pretty to look at and which also includes bread products), the food court (a highlight of the Gastronomical Tour) and the last section which I like to call "random crap." Its basically a combination of the Berkeley Bowl, the Ferry Building farmer's market, and a really good flea market.


The last stop on the wild photographic tour of my Victorian life so far is St. Kilda's Beach. St. Kilda's is an beach-side section of Melbourne filled with twisty streets, great cafes, grungy bars, and the original Jewish settlement in Melbourne. Most of the religious Jews have moved out to the newer suburbs there, but I managed to get kosher kebabs when I was there. My roommate and I made our way down on Sunday for the St. Kilda's Festival, this crazy weekend-long party with lots of music, crafts, and food. My favorite section of St. Kilda's is Luna Park - its an ancient boardwalk that has the oldest hand-operated wooden roller coaster in the world. Each car on the coaster is manned by a conducter who has to pull a hand-brake when the cars speed down the coaster to fast. I haven't ridden it yet, but its' on my to-do list. Right now I just get a kick out of the terrifying moon at the entrance to the park.

Thats it for now - tomorrow we have university orientation, which will most likely act as a distressing reminder that I actually have to do WORK while I'm here. I'll find out what classes I'm taking, how often I actually have to show up to them, and most importantly, what days I have off for travelling. Its midnight here though, so I'm for bed.