Tassie!

I am writing from Hobart, Tasmania on our day of freedom, which is -as usual- rainy. But I have so much (not that much) to update since Melbourne! Well, the most exciting thing that happened to us lately was our "ferry" ride across to Devonport, Tasmania. It was not a ferry! It was almost a cruise ship! It was very fun, we had dinner on the boat, it was not particularly rough sailing at all, and woke up to beautiful skies and the Tassie coastline.

We spent the day --Monday--driving down the length of the island towards Hobart. We stopped at the Great Lake....and some other places, attempted and failed to climb Mt. Wellington in our van, and finally made it to the hostel. The hostel was an interesting situation in itself-- it was the day before their opening day-- we were the first to stay there! So it had no sign, and was still in construction more or less. But it all worked out. And I spent yesterday afternoon and all day today walking around Hobart. Tasmania is at the ends of the earth, and I can't believe people just live here, like that is normal.

Here is a picture of driving through Tassie that I took from the van ride. It is a very beautiful place, but heavily heavily logged. We heard that the logging industry basically runs the country, and in an article we read they referred to it as "Gunnsmania"- Gunn being the big logging company. But....I'm sure we'll hear all about that on our trip. We leave tomorrow and we are making our way to the west, going through Cradle/ Lake St. Clair national parks, old prisons, taking a boat trip up a river, camping....seeing the land. We get back to Devonport Monday night to take the ferry back over to Melbourne, have Tuesday free in Melbourne, and then start the journey back up to Byron Bay.

This last picture is Hobart at 6pm yesterday... completely empty! Seriously, where is everyone? This is a main road.

Well, I think that's it from here. I put up a few more pictures on Facebook, here is the link: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2071894&id=9803563&l=ef1a1

Hope everyone is doing well and talk to you soon!

The Train Ride

We made it to Melbourne! It was a long trip, which started at Casino-- beef capital of Australia. We took a 12-hour overnight train to Sydney, and then about 30 min after getting to Sydney got on an identical 12-hour ride to Melbourne. Long trip. But Melbourne is very beautiful and trendy and warm and nice and full of bikes and trams. We are staying at the Nunnery Hostel and today spent the afternoon at that sustainability festival -after having 3 hours of class at the central library. The festival was great and I had an inspiration for my ISP project which I spent 2 hours hearing about at the festival. They are called transition towns, and they are started to be worked on over here. I would look into how they work, how they are set up, what are the challenges... maybe go stay for a week or so talking to people. Here is a website: http://www.transitiontowns.org/ Anyway I am very excited about this idea and I think I could make it work! And the movement in Australia is just trying to get going so I think they will be excited by anyone doing research on them and will be happy to help out. So that is the new goal.

Tonight the plan is for me, Epps, and Michelle to try and locate the Melbourne Synagogue for Shabbat to experience some Australian Judaism. I hope it works out! Judaism failed in Byron Bay, turns out they don't hold regular srevices or anything, just not enough people. And we are free to roam all day tomorrow and Sunday, when we get on the 'Spirit of Tasmania' ferry for our overnight trip at around 8pm. We heard the ride over is on one of the 'roughest stretches of water in the world'! Should be interesting. So that's about it from here! I am trying to add a few photos now on Facebook, I will add the link here verrrrry sooooon

ALSO! The Orion's Belt constellation is definitely upside down from here! That's how I know that I am in Australia. And this is who I sat next to on the train: http://www.odt.co.nz/your-town/dunedin/35710/rotary-award-city039s-039pen-man039, he even gave me two pens!

Ok, these pictures are taking forever to upload. Hope this works: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2071894&id=9803563&l=ef1a1

Life in Byron

Hello again. We've been in Byron a week now and all is well. The pictures I'm about to add are a little deceiving though, they are from our one day of beautiful weather. Since then it has been gray and raining here. But this is the Byron beach that is just a few minutes walk from our Byron Central Apartments.

The last two days we spent back at our orientation site doing a sustainability workshop- 9 to 5 both days. And today we have the day off in Byron-- but it is more like we are wandering the streets until 5pm, because we had to check out of our rooms earlier. But at 5 we catch a bus to Casino where we get our overnight train to Sydney where we switch to our day long train to Melbourne. We finally get there about 7pm tomorrow. This is the festival we are going to in Melbin: http://www.slf.org.au/festival/ looks good right?

And then I think Sunday night we take the overnight ferry to Tassie and drive around the island to Hobart, where we will be for 2 days before we go into the bush camping. So life is picking up again and looks to be very exciting but hectic.

We are also now starting to think about what we want to do for our ISP's (Oy -S-P's in Australian) This is our big independent project for the last 5 weeks of the program. I don't feel tooooo strongly about any of my ideas-- my most developed one is maybe doing something with A Better Place's electric car idea, because their plan is to hook up Melbourne- Sydney-Brisbane which is kind of my area. But I don't know, I basically hope to be inspired and find ideas at this festival.




And so I guess that's it! Life is good here, the group is great and I have met some very wonderful friends, and basically, don't worry about me!

We make it back to Byron on the night of March 4 -daffyyyyy- so I will be in and out of contact until then. 2 weeks from today that is. Ok, I have run out of updates, talk to everyone soon or later!

One sandwich short of a picnic

This is my new favorite Australian expression-- it means that you're crazy! But on another note.... I am in Byron Bay! And life on the program is great but very hectic. We have been having very intensive orientation/group bonding/ being cut off from society time. Let me start at the beginning, I can't believe I have only been here in the land one week! So one of these pictures is of 7 Mile Beach. We spent about 5 days and 4 nights there for orientation. It was intense because it was in tents! (the other picture is of our tent city)



We lived in these tents with all our stuff, and well, it was interesting. I think I will have to put most pictures on facebook and then add a link, adding one by one is taking so long. The group is great- 17 good kids. And Peter our director is also excellent. We got to Byron Bay Wednesday night after orientation for a tease of this town. We left early the next morning for an eco-philosophy workshop in the middle of the rainforest at a forest meditation center. It was....rustic... as Peter said. It poured rain the entire time and we sat in a meditation hall with a tin roof listening. We slept in a loft over the kitchen, and dealt with leeches for most of the time.
But now we are back in Byron! Though it is raining now, it is a very cool town-- full of surfers, hippies, old hippies, backpackers...all kinds. We live at the 'Byron Central Apts' which are very nice, and tomorrow meet for class at the Byron community center. Internet abilities are on and off, and we leave Wednesday already for Melbourne (Melbin) for a 4day Sustainability Festival. We are taking a 20 hour train ride down, and then eventually an overnight ferry to Tassie (Tasmania...) where we will be traveling about a week. After the ferry and train trip back up, we make it to Byron march 5 I believe. And then its homestay time and then it just keeps going. So! Crazy program, until April 9 when we start our 5 week independent projects, and then we are free to go on our way.

(This is a picture of me, Epps, and Laura sleeping in 'the loft' Thursday night)
So all is well here. Australia is a great, happy, welcoming, beautiful place and I am excited to see more, do more, and get a little more settled. My main priorities right now though are laundry from the last 2 weeks, groceries, and putting up some more pictures. Hope everyone's doing well and talk to you soon!

For a few more pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2071894&id=9803563&l=4a3e2

Kookaburra Inn

I am in Brisbane! At the Kookaburra Inn in my ownnn roooooom, and I finally figured out how to post all these pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2071464&l=e78b7&id=9803563

wow, I hope that works, because that was a stressful last hour! Anyway, everything is great here. It was very exciting to finally make it to Australia, make it to Kookaburra, and all be well. I even got a cell phone, productive day, and the number is (61)41-261-6522. Australian out of the ordinary helpfulness is what made this possible.

Anyway, point is, I can't make this writing not be in italics. australia is hard. my hour internet card is almost up, but with these pictures posted, i am at peace. Now its starting to dawn on me that day in Brisbane is over, time before program is over, and it all really starts tomorrow. I head back to the airport at 7am, and it will all of a sudden start. I am very excited though, to meet the people, to live in Byron, I think it will be excellent. And time will move fast and life will be bright!

Hong Kong

I am writing from a dorm room in Hong Kong University (HKU....many things here are actually referred to with an acronym, and I get that). All is very well, and I will post pictures once I get to Australia Thursday and can get internet on my own laptop. The last 3 days have been.......Chinese! I've spent them trying to figure out subways, buses, and minibuses and following the 'neighborhood walks' section of my guidebook. Sunday afternoon I finally made it to Aviya's dorm-- I have only made it to most places I was trying to go because of friendly Chinese people who usually happened to be going to the same place and when I asked for directions, would say 'you come with me'...and I did! And it has so far worked out great!

I have been wandering around Hong Kong by myself the last few days, yesterday taking the subway over to Kowloon and the neighborhoods of Mong Kok and Yau Mei Tsei (ok I kind of made up that last one, but it was something like that). I found bird markets, flower markets, regular markets, jade markets, and even a Chinese present for Daffy! (which I miiiiight still have with me in 4 1/2 months) Then yesterday afternoon I met up with Danielle and we walked around in 'Causeway' which is the Times Square sort of area, and got local snacks (but not too local --those are the octopus and strange forms of meat--) which usually involve mango in some form. Today I took the ferry across the harbor to Tsim Shau Tau (...?) whoops ok this time I went to check, it's called Tsim Sha Tsui and walked around there. And toniiiiiiight Aviya and I took the tram up to the peak for an amazing amazing panoramic view of the city at night. Really,this would be so much more interesting with pictures, and I will post them sooooooon.

So tomorrow is my last day, and even though I've had lots of cultural experiences, I am READY to head down to Aussie and let the semester begin and the adventures continue!