“How ya goin?”  That’s one of the top said phrases over here.  Just a simple combo between how’s it going and how ya doing.  Pretty streamlined!  Australians tend to shorten as much as they can.  Not with acronyms or anything like the U.S., but with normal daily words.  Sunglasses, for example, are sunnies.  It’s fun!

So Bush Week was last week and was quite the scene.  We had cultural coffee night, Aussie-style barbeque, trivia night, Christmas in July party, and a big welcome dinner for all the new students.  The highlight of Bush Week, however, was Drag Night.  There were so many participants who went all out for it!!  I don’t think this would happen in America.  The acceptance of cross-dressing, at least on the college level, is much greater than I expected.  There were at least one hundred or so students who dressed in the opposite gender’s attire and had a ball!  The guys especially really seemed to love their new found freedom…  Everyone got very into it!

Classes are going well so far.  For each class, I have one or two lectures per week, and a one or two hour tutorial.  The tutorials are small break out classes designed to ensure we understand the material that we covered in lecture.  It’s a good system, but different from what I’ve had at Penn State.  Thanks to a small campus in Erie, I’ve grown used to classes averaging around forty people.  The tutorials are like this, but the lectures are almost two hundred people sometimes.  At University Park, students are used to that, but it’s still a change for me! 

One good thing over here though is the textbook situation.  Never have I ever had a professor not assign a book because he doesn’t have the damage to the environment from book production on his conscience.  Unlike the usual $600-800 on books per semester, I finally spent less than $200.  It’s great!  The United States should pick this idea up quickly…

This coming week, the Bollywood Dance class that I signed up for starts.  That will certainly be an experience!  The most I’ve done is a bellydancing class once, so this should be an expansion of that for sure! 

This coming weekend I’m going to Melbourne.  I promise I’ll have pictures up for that trip!  I’m taking an overnight bus down on Friday, staying at the Melbourne Central YHA for three nights, then coming back up Tuesday morning with Virgin Blue.  While I’m there, I plan to go to the Melbourne Crickets Grounds to see an AFL game on Saturday night.  I might also learn how to kite board!  I’ll blog all about it once I get back. 

Catch ya!

Location: Canberra, Australia