It's officially been one week since I came to Australia - though technically it's been 8 days - and it has been a wild ride ever since.
From being insanely culture shocked the first day, to having nerf gun fights for about 3 hours one afternoon, to getting to know all my classes, I'd say I'm doing okay.
The campus is much bigger than my campus back home, which is a bit daunting. All the buildings are outside, and a lot of the campus is designed to force students to be outside; none of this Brock U fear the outdoors stuff. I have found all my courses, but I can't say that I'm registered in them just yet.
I'm apparently the first student in my program to go on an international exchange, so it was particularly difficult for me to get all my courses approved. I finally got them all approved from Brock, but I haven't heard word from Curtin yet as to whether or not I'm registered in my final course - which is daunting, as it starts on Monday. I might just go to a couple different lectures of courses I hope to be in, so that I don't miss anything. I'm also curious as to whether or not I can do more than 4 courses - but that's a question for another day; tomorrow.
O-Week is now over, but not before the big O-week party that's happening tonight that I'm going to check out. I've made quite a few friends so far, but I'm not entirely happy with the amount. I would have liked to meet a lot more people, but I keep reminding myself that it's only been a week, and that there is plenty more time to meet some more people.
I'm growing increasingly more curious / worried as to what I am going to do this summer. Sure it would be awesome to grab a job in the city, make lots of cash and live in a flat, but that's not how life always turns out. The majority of the friends I've made right now (and I assume the ones I'm going to make) will leave the city during the summer to go back to their homes which is basically going to leave me with not much a social life. I'm hoping that I can meet some people who might be keen to backpack across the east coast, and that might be an option for me - check out new zealand, etc etc. Even if I don't do that this summer, I've always got the break after Semester 1 in 2013 (the Canadian Summer). I'm also thinking of taking my time coming back to Canada in that summer, maybe stopping over in France and checking out another Brock exchange program so that I could improve my french... but that's a year from now, and a lot of things can change, so I'm not going to put the wagon in front of the horse.
I'm looking forward to some volunteer opportunities that are coming up - and the option to get involved with clubs too. There is a thing called "Guild Day" on this coming Wednesday, which for Brock is a lot like the vendor fair - but bigger. So there's going to be a lot of people there representing all of their clubs, which I'm very excited for. I'm looking to get course credit for volunteering over here in a health care setting, so I'm hoping to join the St. John ambulance. I've also joined the discipline committee I think - but I'm not too sure what's going on there - I think it will be very similar to the RLS, but I will update it once I know what's going on.
Speaking of the RLS, I'm feeling more and more every day that I'd like to go back to it and do one more year... I'm not sure why - it's an insane amount of work - but I'm drawn to it for some reason. I feel like after my experience abroad, and especially my experience with summer camp, that I can do a much better job than I initially did. Plus, if I went back, I can't be in the same building as I was before - so no more stairs. :D
So that's about it for this week. I've attached a picture of me at an international student's breakfast. A couple quick updates though...
I've started cooking... I can make eggs, and toast, and that's about it.
I bought a nerf gun... for defence...
Everything object here has a different name - even the things you would expect to be normal.
I'll be having nightmares about grocery shopping for a week - I spent at least 3 hours in that store.
