It's been kind of a rush the past couple of days. Two hostels and now I'm in Tamworth about to go in to the bush. The train from Sydney to Tamworth took me through some of the most amazing country I've ever seen. We went through what looked like oyster farms, don't quote me on that, prairie like home, foothills like in Colorado, scrub land like Mexico, and mountains like you would expect in some Brazilian rainforest.
I also had a conversation with a retired lawyer/debt collector/bus driver named Shirley who was half sweet grandmother type and half spit fire. If you know my mom, imagine her in 20 years. She informed that I was a "naughty lad" for not having seen my own country before seeing another but that it was fine as long as I fixed the situation when I go home. I agreed that I was ok with that deal and we moved on. She was orginally from New Zealand, has two children, and informed me that they wanted her there but she wanted to be in Sydney...so there. She also let me know that whenever she wondered if she should go to the opera in Sydney she would ask herself the question "Am I worth it?" The answer is always "yes."
The fact that I'm going in to the bush means I won't have e-mail or internet access or access to my mobile until after next Friday. I wish those of you who read this blog, and those of you who don't though you'll never know it, the best and I'll let you all know how it goes next weekend. Good luck with all that you're doing and I'll look forward to letting you know what a Jackeroo actually does! :-)
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Thursday, May 28, 2009
I'm going to start with a story. That story is about a little boy we all know...and some of us love. For the sake of privacy, let's call that little boy Nick. Now Nick is just like most little boys and wanted to help his buddies around the house. It was getting on towards supper time and Nick asked if there was anything he could do to help prepare dinner as he was also very hungry. Again, for the sake of privacy, let's call Nick's friends Marty, Yelf, and Adam. Marty is a consultant for IBM and apparently a pretty good cook, Yelf is a mine engineer and does a great job of blowing things up, and Adam is an ambulance driver who isn't home yet.
In response to Nick's question about helping out Marty looks to Nick and says "Yeah, can you cut the carrots to put in the stir fry?" "Of course." says Nick. "Carrots are easy peasy." Nick first peels the carrot. He then picks up the carrot and knife and begins to split the carrot in to little bits suitable for a stir fry. He knows from Boy Scouts that you don't cut toward your hand. He even thinks this as he cuts toward his hand.
"What happens to his hand?" you ask. Well let me tell you. Nick's knife slips and dives right in to his hand. He cuts his thumb and thinks that it's fine and he'll just put some super glue on it and sleep it off. Adam, the amublance driver, comes home and says "No." Adam takes Nick to the hospital where three hours later, Nick has been roughed up by the local doctors, was the subject of an intern's first attempts at treating a human being, recieved four stitches, and now owes Adam $100. Mind you, this is all after Nick has promised the fellas in the house an American Breakfast this morning.
After 5 hours of sleep Nick gets up, cooks breakfast for five people, does the dishes, watches a great Australian film called "Kenny," calls America and informs his credit card company that he is not a little old lady in Australia spending all of Nick's money, gets a prescription for a medication with codeine, buys lots of bandages and tape, and heads home. He then watches "Transporter 2," an ok film, and finishes up his day visiting with friends and attending a very cool meetings for Rising Generations.
Now I want you to all disperse and discuss what we can learn from little Nick's story...go on...disperse. Come back with 5 things to share with the rest of the class.
In response to Nick's question about helping out Marty looks to Nick and says "Yeah, can you cut the carrots to put in the stir fry?" "Of course." says Nick. "Carrots are easy peasy." Nick first peels the carrot. He then picks up the carrot and knife and begins to split the carrot in to little bits suitable for a stir fry. He knows from Boy Scouts that you don't cut toward your hand. He even thinks this as he cuts toward his hand.
"What happens to his hand?" you ask. Well let me tell you. Nick's knife slips and dives right in to his hand. He cuts his thumb and thinks that it's fine and he'll just put some super glue on it and sleep it off. Adam, the amublance driver, comes home and says "No." Adam takes Nick to the hospital where three hours later, Nick has been roughed up by the local doctors, was the subject of an intern's first attempts at treating a human being, recieved four stitches, and now owes Adam $100. Mind you, this is all after Nick has promised the fellas in the house an American Breakfast this morning.
After 5 hours of sleep Nick gets up, cooks breakfast for five people, does the dishes, watches a great Australian film called "Kenny," calls America and informs his credit card company that he is not a little old lady in Australia spending all of Nick's money, gets a prescription for a medication with codeine, buys lots of bandages and tape, and heads home. He then watches "Transporter 2," an ok film, and finishes up his day visiting with friends and attending a very cool meetings for Rising Generations.
Now I want you to all disperse and discuss what we can learn from little Nick's story...go on...disperse. Come back with 5 things to share with the rest of the class.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Taronga Zoo
I don't know why I thought anything should have changed in the last 3 years...everything was good right up until the ferry. True to form I thought to myself, "it can't be that the ferry is actually on time and is coming in 10 minutes. No, it must be early...yeah, that's it." Due to this line of thought I got on the wrong ferry and ended up in Manly. This was not entirely bad as the ride to Manly yielded some great photos. The negative-nancy portion of my personality must point out however that because I then missed the ride back to Circular Quay, my original wharf, and the trip between Manly and Circular Quay is minimum 1/2 hour, and even after I got back to Circular Quay, I would miss my ferry to Taronga Zoo which would put me back another 1/2 hour, plus the original travel time of the ferry from Circular Quay to Taronga would add another 15 minutes, it would have taken me over 2 hours to correct this mistake via ferry. It was after a lengthy argument with myself that I decided to chance the busses and take an alternative route to the zoo.
I walked to my first stop and low and behold, there were parrots in the trees above me. This is where the lesser known "cup-is-half-full" portion of my personality feels the need to point out that if I hadn't taken the wrong ferry and then missed the ferry to correct that first mistake, I would have never been able to see real live parrots in the "wild" as it were. They kept dropping fruit out of the tree and on to the ground surrounding, and the roof of, the bus stop. It was kind of what I would imagine an animal reenactment of D-day would look like with the parrots being the Germans and humans being the Allied Forces. The Allies were doing their level best to avoid the bombings but could make no ground as far as dislodging the Natzi Birds.
After the confrontation between aerial forces and ground forces, I moved on to my fight to find my way to the zoo. I asked the first bus-driver and he informed me that I would need to transfer and that it would be easy. Luckily, this time, he was right. I made it to the zoo, in a much more reasonable 40 minutes, without further incident and when I approached the ticket counter I was asked if I was a student. I said, "well yes but I can't prove it." and the kind lady said, "well I'll give you %10 for coming on the bus." I thanked her and moved in to my viewing of animals.
Overall the Sydney Zoo lived up to its reputation with well setup exhibits and realistic environments for the animals to live in. The best part of the afternoon was by far the "Free Flight Bird Show." It began with many birds just flying in and landing where they wanted. Then a trainer came out and gave the organized portion of the event. There was a part in the middle where she lost an owl and was unable to go on for a bit because she didn't want 2 birds of prey battling in front of children. The crowd expressed its dissapointment, the older demographic for more sadistic reasons, and started to break up. Luckily they were able to locate and recapture the owl and go on with the show. They finished up with a massive eagle that swooped over people's heads with centimeters to spare. It caused old and young to see through the eyes of a child, which is something that happens far to infrequently, and we were all told to remember our feathered friends in our everyday lives.
I'll finish up with a similar message. Visit your local zoo, aquarium, or museum. There really are some very cool things these institutions are doing that are relevant to us all and they continue to go underutilized. Take a day, you're not that busy, and do something that makes you feel like a kid...it's worth it. :)
Cheers,
I walked to my first stop and low and behold, there were parrots in the trees above me. This is where the lesser known "cup-is-half-full" portion of my personality feels the need to point out that if I hadn't taken the wrong ferry and then missed the ferry to correct that first mistake, I would have never been able to see real live parrots in the "wild" as it were. They kept dropping fruit out of the tree and on to the ground surrounding, and the roof of, the bus stop. It was kind of what I would imagine an animal reenactment of D-day would look like with the parrots being the Germans and humans being the Allied Forces. The Allies were doing their level best to avoid the bombings but could make no ground as far as dislodging the Natzi Birds.
After the confrontation between aerial forces and ground forces, I moved on to my fight to find my way to the zoo. I asked the first bus-driver and he informed me that I would need to transfer and that it would be easy. Luckily, this time, he was right. I made it to the zoo, in a much more reasonable 40 minutes, without further incident and when I approached the ticket counter I was asked if I was a student. I said, "well yes but I can't prove it." and the kind lady said, "well I'll give you %10 for coming on the bus." I thanked her and moved in to my viewing of animals.
Overall the Sydney Zoo lived up to its reputation with well setup exhibits and realistic environments for the animals to live in. The best part of the afternoon was by far the "Free Flight Bird Show." It began with many birds just flying in and landing where they wanted. Then a trainer came out and gave the organized portion of the event. There was a part in the middle where she lost an owl and was unable to go on for a bit because she didn't want 2 birds of prey battling in front of children. The crowd expressed its dissapointment, the older demographic for more sadistic reasons, and started to break up. Luckily they were able to locate and recapture the owl and go on with the show. They finished up with a massive eagle that swooped over people's heads with centimeters to spare. It caused old and young to see through the eyes of a child, which is something that happens far to infrequently, and we were all told to remember our feathered friends in our everyday lives.
I'll finish up with a similar message. Visit your local zoo, aquarium, or museum. There really are some very cool things these institutions are doing that are relevant to us all and they continue to go underutilized. Take a day, you're not that busy, and do something that makes you feel like a kid...it's worth it. :)
Cheers,
Monday, May 25, 2009
Sooooo, I realize I'm new to this whole blogging experience. Please bear with me as I figure it out.
10am, I'm going to the Taronga zoo today. The rumor on the street is that it's one of the best zoos in the world. It has some of the best facilities as far as trying to create a habitat instead of just concrete. This means however, that I have to find my way there via public transport. For those of you who remember my first ventures into the twin cities area, you know that this could get fun.
Dinner last night was awesome. Lace made some Thai dish with garlic bread. We sat around and talked about religion and our beliefs. We talked about some really deep things like if we were able to know when we would die or our odds of having a disease. The answer was universally no. These guys seem to know so much about their faith and their thoughts on life. It's evident these conversations happen a lot. The flip side is that there is also just light banter. Joking followed by laughter is not uncommon and it's a really cool atmosphere they've created.
Off to the zoo...here's hoping I have some luck today!
10am, I'm going to the Taronga zoo today. The rumor on the street is that it's one of the best zoos in the world. It has some of the best facilities as far as trying to create a habitat instead of just concrete. This means however, that I have to find my way there via public transport. For those of you who remember my first ventures into the twin cities area, you know that this could get fun.
Dinner last night was awesome. Lace made some Thai dish with garlic bread. We sat around and talked about religion and our beliefs. We talked about some really deep things like if we were able to know when we would die or our odds of having a disease. The answer was universally no. These guys seem to know so much about their faith and their thoughts on life. It's evident these conversations happen a lot. The flip side is that there is also just light banter. Joking followed by laughter is not uncommon and it's a really cool atmosphere they've created.
Off to the zoo...here's hoping I have some luck today!
Darling Harbour and the Sydney Aquarium
Wowzers! The aquarium was phenomenal. I was able to literally look up at sharks and dugongs, huge manta rays and giant sucker fish, and was able to see a real live platypus. The animals themselves were amazing and awe inspiring. I was also able to see a show where they fed a 21 year old female, salt-water, crocodile rats from the end of a grandma-style, "I can't reach it" stick. They opened a crack and the croc sank deeper in to the water. They opened the door fully and the croc charged out of the water. Fortunately the worker had a shield, like the ones the riot-police have, made of plexi-glass and two handles. This wasn't this guy's first rodeo if you know what I mean. He was looking away and the croc lunged for his face. He didn't even flinch! He just raised the shield a little further and continued on like nothing had happened. After they explained a little about the crocs, a girl came out with the rats and the croc must have done a straight up +6 foot leap to get it.(no big deal)
The sharks were also the bomb-diggity. They must have been over 7.5 feet long and were massively round. The biggest ones could have definitely eaten a small child without making smaller "pieces" if you will.(I will) They weren't even great whites! They were "just" grey nurses...whatever. They're ok I guess.
Gotta shoot off, dinner is almost ready...we're making food tonight. We'll finally see what kind of cook Lace is! :)
The sharks were also the bomb-diggity. They must have been over 7.5 feet long and were massively round. The biggest ones could have definitely eaten a small child without making smaller "pieces" if you will.(I will) They weren't even great whites! They were "just" grey nurses...whatever. They're ok I guess.
Gotta shoot off, dinner is almost ready...we're making food tonight. We'll finally see what kind of cook Lace is! :)
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Inaugural Post
Hello all,
Nick here across the ocean in the wonderful city of Sydney, Australia. It's been a great few days...we are currently 15 hours ahead of you all in the states. That means it's almost 10am on the 25th and still 7pm on the 24th where you all are.
A quick update before I go to my orientation here...the flight over is rough. For those of you who have never spent a significant amount of time in one seat(about 14 hours worth), it gets a little on the long side. On the plus side, I was able to watch a lot of Discovery Channel and started watching that one movie that's almost like Pursuit of Happiness.(I got bored and went to sleep) The meals were a little like middle school when they can get you because you don't have another choice...there were three of them and you were appreciative every time. You knew that if you denied one you would regret it later.
When I arrived I was met by Handsome Rob, one of Greg Tehvens friends, and we went for coffee where he told me about some of the faux pas I could make over here. There are a few which I will have to detail later...
Gotta go, the orientation is about to start. Have to know about where I'm at! Wish me luck and I'll post again soon.
Nick here across the ocean in the wonderful city of Sydney, Australia. It's been a great few days...we are currently 15 hours ahead of you all in the states. That means it's almost 10am on the 25th and still 7pm on the 24th where you all are.
A quick update before I go to my orientation here...the flight over is rough. For those of you who have never spent a significant amount of time in one seat(about 14 hours worth), it gets a little on the long side. On the plus side, I was able to watch a lot of Discovery Channel and started watching that one movie that's almost like Pursuit of Happiness.(I got bored and went to sleep) The meals were a little like middle school when they can get you because you don't have another choice...there were three of them and you were appreciative every time. You knew that if you denied one you would regret it later.
When I arrived I was met by Handsome Rob, one of Greg Tehvens friends, and we went for coffee where he told me about some of the faux pas I could make over here. There are a few which I will have to detail later...
Gotta go, the orientation is about to start. Have to know about where I'm at! Wish me luck and I'll post again soon.
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