Nation's Capital!

No, sillies, not Washington D.C, but Canberra!! This past weekend, Caitlin, Steph and I visited Australia's Capital Territory to check out what was all about. Canberra did remind me a lot of DC though, so I was a little more homesick than usual.

We left Friday morning on a bus that was similar to a Greyhound bus. Our other options for getting to Canberra would have been to fly or take a train, but for either of those, we would have had to get to Sydney first. The bus picked us up in Wollongong city, just one train stop down. It was a three hour bus ride, so we napped for the most part. The times when I was awake though, I was able to check out more of Australia's land and sky scape. I decided that I could totally see dinosaurs roaming around in Australia, even right now. It was a strange thought. Because it was a cloudy day, I saw a really pretty sun-cloud thing - the sun would go behind a cloud, and I guess because the cloud was thinner/filled with water, it created a rainbow effect around the edges of the cloud. It was absolutely gorgeous and I wished I had remembered my camera (yup, I'm the tool that forgot my camera...totally wasn't thinking!) so that I could have gotten a snap of it. Oh well - I at least will always remember it.

We arrive in Canberra and walk to our hostel. We were in a 10 person mixed room (the cheapest option). By the time we freshen up and eat our lunches, we have to get a cab to the National Zoo and Aquarium. For the most part, that was the only option for getting to and from the National Zoo. The zoo is privately owned and is about a 5 minute drive out of the city, but it would have been impossible to walk to because walking on the freeway just doesn't seem like a good idea.

So why did I go to the zoo?! For the Zooventure tour! We got a behind the scene look at animals, and the coolest part was that we got to feed them! The tour started off with the European brown bear, which apparently is the smallest of the brown bears. Regardless, it was still huge, and to see it lumbering towards you was a little bit frightening, despite the fence in between us. The zookeeper/our tour guide Leigh put some honey/wheatbix/apple mixture on our hands and the bear licked it off. The bear was quite adorable - as it was licking my hand, it would close its eyes. Precious! Bears are Steph's favorite animals, so she was pretty psyched to have one lick food off her hand.

After the bear, we made our way over to my favorite animal, the tiger!! We fed the smallest tiger of the tigers, a Sumatran Tiger. They had a Bengal tiger, but it was his starve day so we couldn't feed him. Because tigers don't eat every day in the wild, the zoo tries to replicate that and so two random days during the week they don't feed the tigers. Anyway, we fed the tiger cow heart, but not with our hands - it was instead just with a pair of tongs. The cool thing was that you could put the meat up high and watch the tiger jump up and attach himself to the fence to eat at it. Absolutely gorgeous animals, and he was so strong too! I would say that I want a tiger, but I respect them too much to ever want to take one out of it's native environment. I did see a show once where they took baby big cats to this one family and the family helped them grow up. I would do that, for sure.

Ok, moving on. Other animals that we fed: otters (we flung fish at them, which they then grabbed and ran off to their pool to clean), giraffes (when you see them up close, they are very strange looking animals indeed), cougars (you could see the muscles bunching up under their skin when they walked around), elands (basically like a big gazelle - their horns were super scary too), and six white lions. These lions are white because of a mutation - it's a recessive gene, much like how blue eyes and blonde hair is for humans. The white lion has gone extinct in the wild - the last one to be seen was spotted in 1994 I think it was. Anyway, this zoo had a whole pride of them - six male white lions. At first, only one came over to be fed, but then the rest of them showed up. Ok, so, picture SIX huge lions all competing against one another to get a piece of meat. It got kind of intense at some points when they would start pushing/shoving one another out of the way and would start roaring at one another. Granted, we didn't get a full on roar, but there were definitely some little half roars. Now, picture all that happening with only a fence separating you from the lions. Gorgeous animals, but knowing that all of them could probably find a way to bust out and kill you is a little intimidating. When we were done feeding them, they all just stayed by the fence, all lined up. It was a picture perfect moment, which of course would happen when I don't have my camera. Steph and Caitlin got it though, so as soon as I have their pictures I'll share with you all.

We also had encounters with two other animals. The zoo had two dingoes, so Leigh put them on leashes and brought them out to us so we could pet them. They're basically like dogs, except they're a little more devious. It made me miss Bella even more than I already do! The last animal we got to hold - a snake! I thought it was the coolest thing ever and have already decided to own a snake some day. Some of the other people in the group didn't enjoy it as much, but Leigh said this was the first group in about six months where everyone had actually allowed the snake to go around their neck. After washing our hands, we left the zoo. All in all, it was a really cool experience - I doubt I'll ever get that close to these types of animals again my life. I guess that's kinda sad to think about, actually.

We catch a cab back to the city and go to an Irish pub called King O'Malley's for dinner, then head on back to the hostel to figure out what we want to do. Luckily for us, we walk by the Canberra Centre - a HUGE shopping mall. We spent about two and a half hours in it Friday night and then more time on Saturday and still didn't see all of it. In Wollongong city, there is a mall, but it is small and not really legitimate, so this was an exciting change. I got a shirt with a tiger on it and a really cheap pair of boots ($20). Friday nights the mall stays open late, so we were there until 930 or so. We then actually make it back to the hostel and try to decide what we want to do in the coming days. Because we were all pretty exhausted, we go to sleep around 10 (or at least got ready for bed until 10 - I went and watched some poker and talked to some kid from Western Australia who had broken both his wrists and feet in a motorcycle accident and so was going to have to have his right wrist fused straight because of cartilage damage, so he was doing a snowboarding tour of Japan/Australia as a last hurrah).

Although we had intended to wake up at 930, we actually slept until 1130 or so. It was okay though, because we discovered a flyer in our room for an 'explorer bus' which means we could hit up a lot of the historical sites Sunday and not worry about how to get around to all of them. So, we go into the mall again to look at opals, shop around a bit more, and Steph and Caitlin got haircuts. I've actually needed my ends trimmed really badly, but then one night last week I got really sick of them and just cut them off myself. We left the mall to go to a place called the Gorman Markets, which was a little arts market. Very quaint, and one of the men selling stuff there told us some funny stories about America and the US. First though, he thought we were Canadian because I was wearing my Canada hat. I was actually mistaken for Canadian a couple of times because of the hat, but it's no big deal to me - I love Canada! Anyway, he told us that when America coughs, Australia gets pneumonia, meaning that whatever happens to America hits Australia worse. He also said that America practically owns Australia, ever since WW2. He told us a few other stories about his times in America, but I liked that he was practical about it. He wasn't angry at America for the fact that we 'owned' Australia, he was just realistic about it. Here is a joke he told us:
Two American men decide to go on a tour of the world to survey men on what the sex life is like for men all over the globe. They're about to head back to America when they realize that they've forgotten Australia. They get there and realize that they're going to have to stay for a while because of how big it is, so they rent an apartment on Bondi Beach in Sydney (Bondi is Australia's most famous beach). They go out the next day and see what looks like the typical Australian - chiseled body, gorgeous tan, and wearing a speedo. They go up to him and say, "Hi, we're conducting a survey - about how many times do you have sex?" And the Aussie says, "About twice a month." The Americans are amazed by this - they say "Only twice a month?! The Peruvian sheep herders have more than that!" The Australian shrugs and says, "Hm, I don't think it's too bad for a Catholic priest with no car."
Interesting, eh?

We return from the market and walk back to our hostel to drop off our spoils, then walk out to Regatta Point. There is a lake that cuts Canberra in half and this was just one point where you could see all around it as well as a bunch of museums/important places. It was a pretty sight, but I think that the cold kind of diminished how cool it could have been. There is also a Captain Cook Memorial Water Jet (Cook 'discovered' Australia) that shoots water 90 meters up in the air, but it was turned off for maintenance. So, we walk back to the hostel and plan out what we want to do for the night. We had about an hour to kill before we had to go out for dinner, so we put on our bathing suits and headed down to the pool, hot tub, and sauna that is in the basement of our hostel. It was so relaxing!! Definitely a good break for all three of us - we had all had really stressful weeks last week. We get ready to go out and then go to dinner a Wagamama's a Japanese restaurant. After a delicious meal (and because it was Japanese, it filled us up but didn't make us feel gross) we go out and sample some of Canberra's nightlife. When we told people we were going to Canberra, they were like, ew, why would you go there, there's nothing to do! We did not find this to be the case though - it was so much fun! We went to four different bars and had a great night.

We woke up the next morning to check out of the hostel and go on our Explorer Bus tour. Although it wasn't going to give us a lot of time at each spot, it was still worth it to us because it provided a source of transportation, and getting around Canberra was kind of confusing unless you were walking or catching a cab. Our first stop was the War Memorial, which is the most visited museum in Australia. It is a stunning memorial - it has the names of every Australian who had been killed in war, as well as every theatre of war/peacekeeping in which Australia had participated. Underneath the memorial is the museum, of which we saw two exhibits. I really wanted to see the World War 1 section because that's what I've been learning about for the past 12 weeks of uni. I liked that I got to see some tangible artifacts from the time period to add to my knowledge. I felt a bit like a historian even - Steph would ask me questions about the war and I would be able to rattle off the answer. So for anyone out there who doesn't think I've been doing work here and just playing, you can test me by asking me about the Great War and Australia. We also visited the A is for Animal exhibit - I think it's supposed to be more geared towards children, but we figured it would be interesting nonetheless. And it was - did you know they used koalas and kangaroos as mascots in wars, as well as any other animal that they found and didn't use for eating? If I ever go to war, I would want an animal companion as well.

Our next stop was Parliament. We weren't going to have enough time to take the tour, so we walked around by ourselves. The new Parliament building was built in 1988 (go '88 - lots of good things happened!) so it was really pretty - there were marble staircases and a lot of glass. We went up to the roof and got a bird's eye view of Canberra. We wandered around and sat in both the House of Representatives and the Senate Room - I'm still amazed at how small these rooms are - it was the same way in New Zealand - I'm just used to America.

We were supposed to be picked up from Parliament around 245, but the bus never showed (Although the driver said she went there a few times looking for us - bollocks I say!), so we ended up catching a cab to the National Museum of Australia. The museum was AWESOME! There were so many things to do and each of us was completely entertained - it was just a shame that we didn't have more time there. We decided that we thought we had an adequate amount of time in the War Memorial and Parliament, but we would have wanted to spend way more time in the museum. We only made it through 1.5 exhibits - one about the animals in Australia and then we saw part of the Aboriginal exhibit. There was a room right before the Aboriginal exhibit and it was dark but with 6 big tv screens that had some Aboriginal dancing, so we took a break from looking at things and just danced like Aboriginals. It was absolutely silly but one of the best parts of the trip, in my opinion.

We caught the Explorer bus back to the hostel, picked up our bags, and went to a place called Koko Black. We know a few people at Wollongong from Canberra, and they suggested this place for us to visit. It's a chocolatier sort of place, and although they had lots of chocolates inside, we sat outside (they have outdoor heaters) and ordered drinks - I got a cinnamon hot chocolate, and Cait and Steph got Ice Chocolates. Mine was absolutely delicious - it was rich and thick though, so I couldn't drink it really fast. The Ice Chocolates were basically chocolate, milk, ice cream, chocolate syrup, and chocolate shavings. They were pretty good too, but I enjoyed my hot beverage.

After that we walked to the bus station to catch our bus back to Wollongong. It was relatively uneventful, but I do have to give mad props to the bus driver. We were driving down a mountain, and some of the turns were absolutely deadly. If you attempted to go around them at maybe even 20 miles an hour you would probably fly off the road. At one point the bus had to back up in order to actually make it around a turn. There were red signs saying something to the effect of "EXTREME TURN YOU WILL DIE IF YOU ARE NOT GOING 15 KM/H!!" Ok maybe not to that extreme, but the limit was 15 km/h, which is I believe 9.3 mph. I honestly can't even think of any turns or roads in general to compare what driving on this mountain was like, but it reminded me of driving in New Zealand - there were times when I was scared to put the camper into fourth gear just because I didn't know how intense some of the turns were going to be.

Ok, so this is an extremely long post - I was going to write another one about life in general, but I'll just include a quick summary here. Last week I completed two of my three final papers and I'm working on my third one now. This week coming up is my last week of uni - I only have 5.5 hours of class (approximately, assuming I don't get out early for any of my classes) so I should get this paper done relatively quickly. After that, I have two journals due and then only one final. After June 15, I will have academically completed my stay in Australia. It's crazy, May went by so friggin fast. Before I know it, it's going to be June 29 and I'm going to have to pack up my life here and just hope that everything fits in my bags!

(A side note - I just spell checked this post and Wheatbix came up as spelled incorrectly - it's basically like Frosted Wheats - but one of the options for a correct spelling was Wetback...wtf mate? How is that pc??)