Living for the Weekend

Week 5

This was the most exciting weekend I have had by far since I’m been down under. On Saturday I went to Caversham Wildlife Park about an hour drive away Fremantle. It was so exciting. The highlight of my day was petting and feeding kangaroos. The zookeepers are well educated on all the fascinating animals I saw. I learned that female kangaroos have not one but three vaginas. If they are pregnant they can delay their progress and conceive another baby. Baby kangaroos are called joeys. My friends and I were amazed when we saw a joey stretching around in its mama’s pouch. The fur of a kangaroo is so smooth and soft. I cannot imagine how soft and comfy inside the pouch.  

The zookeepers explained to us that the white kangaroos are specially breed by them. It was so cool to see the joeys and kangaroos casually hop around. The are so friendly, even small children pet them while their parents warned them not to step on their tails. I will let all the pictures speak for themselves.

Koala Bears! They sleep about 18 hours a day!

I had to be careful to only pet the sleeping koala with the back of my hand. If you don't they could get feisty! 

The owl was a little camera shy

 It's a WOMBAT! 

Joey!!

They look so cool relaxing, almost like humans!

Shaving the wool off the sheep, talk about hard labor. It really is a technique!

The final result, a good trimmer will have the entire wool coat in one piece!

The kids fed milk to the sheep, this little girl was a natural. The boy needed a little help.

It's hardly my first time milking a cow, I have a some experience on the farm in Canada with my family.

I still have the technique down!

On our way back home, our bus dropped us off for a quick twenty-minute visit to the Margaret River Chocolate Factory. I tasted all of their samples! When I asked for another delicious strawberry chocolate ball, this extremely tall gentleman told me, “No ma’am it will go straight to your hips!” I laughed. I’m a long distance runner; so I have no fear that my indulgence in chocolate would put me in jeopardy of getting fat. I love chocolate but dark chocolate is my favourite. As I walked away a little sad, the gentleman smoothly dropped the treat I asked for in palm of hand (that was already filled with dark chocolate chips). I was so thankful!

On the bus ride back to Freo I chatted with a classmate from my Journalism class. I am on a mission to find a story to write about for the local newspaper. Once we got back home, I relaxed in my room and took a nice nap.

On Sunday, I was ready for another adventure, cliff jumping! A group of us followed our kind friend from England to Black Wall Reach in Perth. We took a half hour bus ride and walked for fifteen minutes to reach our final destination.

Note to self, don't look down!

Just jump!

I didn't think I would be in the air for that long!

At last, I'm enjoying the cool water!

I was petrified of jumping but honestly the jump is the worst part! After I pushed off the rock, my adrenaline rush was over. I loved the feeling of being in the air and plummeting into the water. That’s the best part! The water felt just right. Now the climb to get back to the top of the cliff was a little challenging. Did I mention that I had to watch out for jellyfish? There were many jellyfish in the water but thankfully the impact of everyone that jumps scared the jellyfish away. It was exhilarating to jump again and again off the cliff. I can finally say that I have gone cliff diving at one of the most beautiful places on earth!

After we took a walk to the Point Walter Sandbar. Now this is place is truly beautiful. I saw black swans! Thankfully the key word for photography this week was water so I had my friend skip a few rocks in the direction of the black swans. This is the photo I edited in Photoshop that I’ll be using this week.

On our way back to the bus stop, I took one last jump off the cliff. I want to go there again before it gets cold. Oh, cold weather for Aussie’s is about 70-75 degrees.

Once the bus dropped us off in Freo, my friends and I went straight to the farmer’s market. I brought up fresh mangos, peaches, apples, pears, grapes, strings beans and tomatoes. I ate one fried crab leg, four squid rings, and four shrimps with fries. I was stuffed. When we got back home I took a long hot shower, washed all the salt water out of my hair and took a nice long nap. I ate dinner then went back to sleep. I didn’t do any homework. Thank God that I have Monday’s off. I was exhausted but this weekend was well worth it.

Cheers,

Katrina

New places, new food and fun pictures

Week 4

 I arrived bright and early for my Digital Photography class on Tuesday. I usually sit at a table by myself but this morning this friendly short young woman from Zambia whom I met last Tuesday waved her hand at me to sit next to her. I was delighted; it was very nice of her. Naturally since we are in this new age of technology we exchanged out fabebook, instagram and numbers. In class we learned more about how to use Photoshop. Our lecturer just told us the most important thing to do is play with the functions in the program and read our camera manual. I always loved photography but now that I am getting a taste for how much work goes into finding the perfect shot, I have a newfound respect for the industry.

This week's keyword is “OLD”, so here’s the picture I thought captured the essense of the word.

Description:  I normally run from Port Lodge to the South Mole Lighthouse every morning. A few days later it finally occurred to me that I might have found the perfect place to capture the sense of something “old”. I took some photos of the lighthouse but I was more intrigued by the iron chains built in the 1890’s. I attempted to focus on the chain and depth of field. 

May I add that my lectuer said that he loved the color of the rust and that I lost a bit of depth of field but overall very good. I was relieved and thrilled with the good news. By the way he critiques everyone’s photo one by one, in front of everyone.

Here is a close up of this dirty old chain!

Here are a few pictures I took for practice during the week.

A few photos I added a few fun tweaks to. 

During my break in between classes I decided to go for a walk because I had to pick up a phone card and buy a birthday card for my big brother. Thankfully, it only cost $2.33 to send a card. It’s rare that I find anything “cheap” on this continent. When I got back home I made myself a nice sandwhich, coming back home and preparing meals is certainly teaching me the difference about having the convience of going to school and ordering food. 

However, the bright side is I do my best to eat healthy food because that what happens when you live in a household when your dad loves to cook and you mom is medical field. Occasionally, I like to indulge in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich accompanied by apple juice and a delicious mango.

While I ate I read the news because this was my first quiz for Journalism class. Each week our lecturer chooses ten questions based upon Australian and International News. So in my spare time I plan to get busy reading newspapers and listening to the radio.

The next day in anthropology class, one brave students asked our lecturers if we could have our one hour tutorial outside. It was the most beautiful day of the week and it just didn’t seem fair to be trapped inside a cold room. My lecturer said, “This is not a democracy” but as she riled up the other students we walked across the street to the park. We all sat in a circle and continued our discussion. It was much better than a classroom setting.

On Thursday evening all the students from my school had a luxurious dinner with our Australia advisor from home and his wife. It was the best meal I have had since I arrived down under.

Hiking vs. Walking

On Saturday morning I woke up bright and early at 8:30 to prepare for our hiking trip to this place called the Bibblimum Track. First we took a train to the big city Perth, then we stayed on that train about another 20-30 and got off at Oak Street Station. We buzzed our handy smart rider cards then excited the track. Oh smartrider cards and like metro card except you must swipe to use the bus or train and swipe off. If you don’t swipe off you will b charged the longest length of your trip. And, if you don’t swipe off you will pay a fine of $100. So always remember to swipe off! It’s a little tedious but the fare it is almost the same as the MTA rates. I usually pay $1.35 to swipe on and off for my trips so far. We asked the locals which bus should we catch to get to Kalamunda. This kind Aussie fellow gave me directions but he spoke a little too fast for me. Long story short, we ended up waiting for twenty minutes at the wrong bus stop. The nice bus driver told us that the correct bus stop was just a block away. This time we waited ten minutes for the right bus and thankfully Kalamunda was the last stop. The trail was just short walk up the road however we didn’t really hike, it was more of a walk. Sadly I didn’t see any kangouroes but we are going to try a different trail next time.

Taken in Perth, after our hike. 

I love green.

Lastly, on Sunday I walked to a small shop to buy two newspapers to prepare for my journalism quiz. Then treated myself to a nice mango passion fruit smoothie. This week went by so fast!  

It's officially been a month since I arrived!

Cheers,

Katrina

Living in a Land Down Under

It’s the beginning of week four in Fremantle, Australia! I’m sorry I didn’t start this blog sooner but better late than never. I have been adjusting to my new life in Australia, I can honestly say that studying abroad was one the greatest decisions I have made. I feel so blessed to have this amazing opportunity and I’m going to blog once a week to share the adventures that I’ll be having for the next few months. First I’ll start with a review of my first three weeks:

(The plane, the service was amazing!)

Week One

The group of Iona students arrived to our new home located a nice 3 minutes walk from the beautiful beach. We are tired, exhausted and in desperate need of a shower. Travelling for nearly a day is exhausting. We flew from JFK to Germany, Germany to Singapore and finally Singapore to Perth, Australia. It was a shock how hot the weather was, the trees are very skinny and tall. Our first mission was to find a taxi for the six of us. I walked up to an airport traffic operator and he said in the coolest accent that I have heard, “You are gonna’ need a maxi taxi, walk down to the other corridor”. I cheerfully thanked him, we walked with all of our heavy luggage to the “maxi taxi” line. Maybe I should have listened to my dad, maybe I over packed just a little. But when you are travelling across the world for four months, you have to be prepared.

In our new home we all have single rooms, we a nice breeze because we are oh so close to the nice blue water and white sand. For the following days we had orientation. I mingled with my fellow Americans but I was truly eager to start school and met Australians. They have many funny acronymns, such as “sunnys” which mean sunglasses, “Could you turn on the aircon?” (aircon = air conditioner) and the even the place we live in isn’t called Fremantle, its Freo.

The highlight of week one was our Scavenger Hunt all over Fremantle and the big city Perth. A throng of study abroad students gathered in the main student office building as each eagerly read the list on the walls to see what group we were in.

I was assigned to group 4, there were about 12 of us, I met students from Ohio, Wisconsin, two nice girls from France and our nice Australian guide (I sadly don’t remember his name) were there to guide us to make sure we boarded the right trains and busses to go to our destination. During the hunt we had to do the strangest things like have everyone do handstands, all at the same time. We had to take a photocopy of someone’s hand; luckily I found a convenience store in Perth and with a copy machine! We had to find a paper menu, to be fair this task seemed ordinary but a friend and I never found one. The most rewarding and tiring part of our six-hour scavenger hunt was walking to King’s Park and the Botanic Garden. First we had to walk up Jacob’s ladder which about 242 steps. We walked up the steps in our 95 degree Fahrenheit, which is about 35 Celsius (I need to get used to Celsius and the metric system). But once we made it to the top, it was worth it. It is the most beautiful park I have ever seen.

At the end of the week, I was glad that we had Sunday to ourselves. So finally we went to the beach! It was fantastic!

Lastly, I wanted to cry out with joy when I received my class schedule. I got into all my top choices and I have a lovely two days off. However, during the next two weeks I realized that time we really be to spend nice long dates with my books in the library and learning how to use my DSLR Nikon Camera for Digital Photography class.

Week Two

It was my first week of school and I felt happy to be back to some structure. It is definitely, a different structure from the United States. The first week was an introduction to how our classes will be in Australia. The chancellor of our school nearly scared of us as she stressed the importance of independent study and how challenging the course work in Australia will be compared to the United States. An Australian girl told us that her experience studying abroad to America, that felt, “no offense, you guys are a bit spoon-fed”. Keeping her words in mind, I felt more determination to prove that would do well academically.

Take a look at my first photography assignment; we have a key word each week. The keyword was “Street”.

(My lecturer like it!)

Here's my small description:

Moments after the keyword “Street” was mentioned during lecture, I thought about objects reside on the streets of Fremantle. As I was walking one day from the Co-Op bookstore, I saw this small gray alley cat walking past an ostentatious motorcycle. I think this picture captures to different walks of life; this small four-legged animal struggling to survive next to a flashy two-wheeled motorcycle used by a person to cruise the streets of Fremantle. I hope this photo reflects that the streets are shared. 

I found these two beautiful birds, while I snapping photos for photography class.

After my first week in school, a group of friends and I went to Perth to experience what the nightlife is like. Unlike the clubs in America that have ventured to, there are band that play live music, they sand covers of popular songs in America. Overall, it was a fun night out. The streets are much more narrow and buildings a many stories shorter than what I am used to in New York City.

Week Three

Class, I mean lecture is a little different from America. I usually have lecture for two to three hours then a break in between to make my lunch. Making instead of swiping my convenient meal plan card, is certainly an adjustment. I sure do miss the home meals that my Dad cooks for my mom and I.

I had my first homework assignments due. For Introduction to Australian History I learned about the conflicts and different viewpoints of how Australia came to exist. It’s a little more complex than just being a continent that the British shipped convicts to.

During the weekend, I ventured to Perth with friends. It's so much fun to be a tourist, especially when people everywhere are so friendly.

A nice ending to the weekend was a trip to the Fremantle market, it has the best deals on fruits and vegetables. I simply couldn't resist. 

Cheers,
Katrina