Settling In

It's been a week since I've arrived in the sunshine coast and so far I've been doing a lot of uninteresting things like buying food, setting up a bank account, figuring out the joys of prepaid cell phones.

Orientation or "O" week started Monday, but most of the sessions relevant to me were on Monday and Tuesday, so the rest of this week I've been taking it easy. Right now I've been meeting a lot of international students like myself. Mostly Germans (there are a 150 Germans here!) and fellow Americans. I'm excited for classes to start and to meet more aussies.

Highlights of the Week
- Winning a Starbucks French Coffee Press at a Trivia Night
- Being a "model" for USC
- Going to Mooloolaba with fellow Americans
- The Unicentral (my apartment complex) Welcome Party

Yesterday I took a bus trip with the school to Kondalilla Falls National Park and to Mary Cairncross Scenic Reserve. The Kondalilla Falls is a 100m (300+ft) waterfall! It was really cool to be in a rainforest. I was hoping to see a Koala but instead saw alot of bush turkeys. Sadly, I think I also broke my camera. At the top of the falls is a tiny waterfall that feeds into a large (and very deep) pool. I was down by the water, sticking my feet in the pool, and when i got up, my camera fell out of my hands into the pool. At first I thought I had lost it completely but luckily i was able to lie down, stick my entire arm in the freezing water and retrieve my soaked camera. Right now I have my camera in a bag of rice (It supposedly helps absorb the water). It probably won't work, but I'm going on a fool's hope. I think I need to invest in a waterproof camera.

At Mary Cairncross, there was a nice path that pointed out some of the native plants like the strangler fig which envelopes other trees till it becomes a gigantic tree itself. I spotted three wallabies and heard lots of unusual bird calls.

Its a lot warmer here than it was in New Zealand, but it still gets surprisingly chilly in the afternoons, I've been drinking a lot of tea to warm my insides!

-Suz