Classes tomorrow!

So I've been at uni now for over a week and the fun still hasn't stopped!  Towson really needs to take a lesson on how to orient people.  Even the lame ice breaker games were fun... like making a guy into a bride out of newspaper.  We have a huge dining hall here where we get 5 meals a week, just dinner, then cook for the rest.  But everyone is 18 and legal to drink, so people bring a 6 pack to dinner or a goon sack and just drink that, soo strange.  Someone try that at Glenn and tell me what happens.  Last night  couple of us had burrito night, and they don't eat rice with it and thought I was crazy for doing it!  No chipotle fans here.  Then my Mexican friends Percy and Ursula are making burritos again tonight, needless to say I'm down.  Finally a REAL burrito!  

The weather has been shit so far... like 70s and overcast with rain and spotches of sun.  It's really unusual because usually it's sunny all day and hot, I picked the wrong time!  I still manage to get red when just sitting at the pool... each dorm has it's own pool area!  And each block has it's own massive outdoor grilling station.  No more getting yelled at for grilling in the village!  

We had our "Back to School" party which was hilarious... theme parties are the best.  We went to 2nd hand shops and had the old ladies help us find the dorkiest stuff, my tie had onions and daisies on it - random!  Here's a pic from it :

All the kids here have to wear these little caps to play outside - "No hat - no play!" 

On Valentine's day we had speed dating which was hilarious.  Some people got really into it but the majority of us just had fun with it.  You got a sheet and after each person had to classify if they were "friend, hookup, loser... etc"  lol I was harsh.  The best was getting an asian or german or french person who hardly spoke english... 2 minutes can be a very long time.  

On friday night we had our mystery dinner, which is where everyone meet in the courtyard, have some drinks, then get onto buses and they take you somewhere but you don't know where.  We were on the bus for an hour!  Then pull into Nelson's Bay - AMAZING PLACE.  We got a cruise boat for dinner, soooo nice.  Seafood buffet!  Tons of Calamari (Meliss you woulda love it, they were huge), oysters, shrimp which they call prawns, barramundi fish and so much more.  There were about 100 kids on the boat on the first level, then the 2nd was open to the public and was a bunch of older couples, and the top was open to see the views.  We had an amazing band with a latina singer who sang love songs and classic 80s/90s hits all night.  After dinner the older people came down to our party and some really old drunk man did a pole dance to his wife for her 60th birthday.  He was a big hit.  The cruise was super nice and it ended around 11 where we all went to he bow (front of the boat I think?) and laid down and looked at the stars.  You can see so much more here, but everything is obviously at a different place in the sky.

It wasn't too expensive for drinks, my friend and I split 4 bottles of wine, each at $18 a piece, which is cheap here.  So drinks... guys get this, a 30 pack of beer is $42. (I can get natty for $14!)  A bottle of Jose Cuervo, $70.  Whiskey is about $50... cheap vodka is like $45.  Goon, or boxed wine, is $10-12.  Luckily I like the cheap goon!  Mixed drinks at bars are called spirits, and are about $8+.  And you can't order shots!!  No shot's allowed, so you have to get it on the rocks and ask if they can leave the ice out, some do.  Oh and they sell bags of chips at bars, so random drunkies are walking around munching on chips... lol.  They also put the stamps or X's on the back of your wrist, which makes it look like a badass tattoo and then can't see it so much the day after.  Smart, eh?  

No thongs (flip flops) are allowed in bars and guys have to wear jeans... cause we were at Customs, this fun indoor/outdoor bar, and Aussies just outta no where will slam an empty glass on the floor and shatter it.  The bartenders don't even care... lol don't try this at Rec Room.  And late night we went into the city and had kabobs.. well this isn't meat on a stick but an amazing burrito/gyro wrap thing, so delicious.  

Their food is a little bit different, they keep eggs warm next to pasta in an aisle at the food store, WoolWorths (Yes, they have WoolWorths!  I'm stoked, I miss the one at home with the diner in it... Pop and Gram would be in heaven).   Their mayonnaise is sweet and gross tasting, ruined my egg and tuna salad.  And their shopping carts have the swivel wheels on the front and back so it's like a slick track and your cart goes everywhere.  All their foods are weighted in kilograms, so I'm clueless to the weight of how much I'm actually buying.  Haven't have the courage to order from the deli yet, sticking to prepackaged lunch meats.  Lizzie I miss our 2 hour long shopping trips :(  

They also have the Big W which is identical to Wallmart.  They have some Target's but they are pricey and not many Aussies like them, opposite eh?  

So classes finally start tomorrow!  The system to sign up is worse than Towsons', believe it or not.  You have to sign up for a lecture for each class which is 3 hours long and meets once a week, AND a toot (tutorial) which meets once a week for an hour.  The toots are just smaller versions of the bigger lectures.  My lectures range in size from 200-500.  Ridic.  So there are a million different class times to schedule, and the system actually lets you book yourself in 2 classes which have the same times - not cool.  But I think I finally got it down, here's my schedule Bunny and Parents :

Monday - Digital Photography, 9-12pm.

Tuesday - Business Venturing, 11-1pm

   Contemporary Management Issues, 2-3pm

                   Business Venturing, 6-7pm

Wednesday - Australian Experience, 1-3pm

  Contemp. Management Issues, 3-5pm

              Australian Experience, 5-6pm

Not too bad, 4 day weekend for trips!  And there's 2 bars here on campus that everyone go to on a regular basis, which is different but really cool.  The big nights to go out are Wed. through Saturday.  Sorry I just noticed I went straight from class schedule to drinking... I promise to study!  I did walk around and try to find my classes today, the campus is huge.  And it's built on a swamp which is pretty neat, but lots of mossies and wildlife.  

I also had to join the campus gym today, the Forum, yes, it's NOT included in tuition, which sucks.  And you can pay every fortnight (2 weeks) or per month, so I did the $52 a month fee - ridic.  But I need it.  It's super nice too, all brand new.  And you get to meet with a personal trainer who develops a program for your needs.  They have tons of free classes like spinning which they call RPMs, body pump, and heaps more, which subsets the fee.  I'm gonna try some, I saw one and it was packed with students and old people too.  Their treadmills and crosstrainers (ellipticals) have a digital touch screen where you can choose from a list of personal digital trainers, shows you running in a stadium, mountain, hill, track - so cool.  And there's a dock for your ipod and you can see all your music and playlists on the screen and play through there.I felt bad because you NEED to carry a sweat towel with you and I didn't know.. I got some bad looks so I made one out of paper towels.  Inappropriate.  

Ok, time for burrito night numero dos.