Adjusting to Oz

The most interesting thing happened today!!

Now that I've got your attention you can read about my day.

I've been apartment hunting a little in the last few days and came across a gold mine! It's a gold mine in two senses. In one way, it's bloody good - it's with 4 other Aussie blokes and a good mate of mine, it's right next to Uni and it's got a lot of good chill out furniture & space. In another sense, it's bloody expensive - It'll cost $200/week not including internet or food. And even though that's not too expensive compared to a lot of other places, it's only just within my budget. I'll probably move in to be honest!

To my surprise, I've been drinking a lot in the last 5 days. Every night there is a party in the village (college at my Uni). It's quite rewarding to know I still have good veteran friends at the village who will invite me to parties or small gatherings and will supply me with food/alcohol. I purchased two Vodka bottles from the airport on the 19th, and I went though 1 on the 1st Uni party. I'm trying to savor the 2nd one.

Two friends of mine in the village which I met about a week ago are actually American! One of them, Jamie, is from California and she's the most social person ever! It's such a relief to experience the energy from America. The other friends, Jada, is from Huston, Texas - she's super friendly and great to be around. They've both been here for 6 months on Exchange and they're preparing themselves to leave Australia tomorrow. We've been clubbing a few times though and that has been great fun. We can't help but let every conversation melt down into a reminiscing session about Texas. I told them that if I ever end up going back to the States I would 'see them if I see em' :p.

The economy is fucking up more and more here. My internship is in jeopardy. I work for Transfield Services in the Water department, but it looks like they're gonna loose their contract with Sydney Water which means I will be made redundant. Anticipating this I'm applying for other internships elsewhere. I'm even willing to work in Coles (crappy supermarket) or Woolworths (crappier supermarket)...

Spotify only got to Australia about two weeks ago. I've been listening to it non stop. I've got an American section on both my ipod and on spotify. It's such a diverse range of music. Half of it is relaxed country music. The other half is fast beat, misogynistic rap.

Slowly but surely I feel myself falling back into the shell I broke out of. I'm rediscovering old habits and getting comfortable being lazy. There are some things I'm doing more like; running, meeting up with different groups of friends etc etc. But it's not enough. I want to be a different person, but it's seeming like an impossible leap. To make things worse, I've still got certain people that I've met on my international journey plaguing my mind all the time, even though I'm sure they've probably forgotten about me...

But I don't want to end this blog on a pessimistic note! I've contacted the UNSW rowing group. I want to row competitively. I think it'll be great to get fit again and be part meaningful club.