Arrival: Perth, Yanchep and Back, Part 1

Finally, after a month and half of winter break and 20+ hours of flight, I have made it to Curtin University in Perth. The trip over went smoothly. Qantas Airlines, despite their egregious grammatical error of having no U after Q, was a tremendous airlines because it had complimentary wine, personalized tvs with the best movies and the nicest flight attendants. Additionally, I was able to stop at the Duty Free Shop in SFO and buy a handle of Crown and JD for 50$, one of the last times I would buy booze that was not unbelievably overpriced. On the connection from Sydney to Perth, I sat next to a beautiful girl from New Zealand named Larissa. After flying with her for four hours, I thought to myself if all the New Zealand girls were like her, I may have a made a huge mistake by going to Australia over New Zealand. At the Perth Airport, I was approached by an Australian who ask me if I was Twig. I looked at him with amazement since what kind of country has people named Twig? Sensing my confusion, he said, "Tommy Kilgore from Trinity?" Quickly, I realized that he met Tweek and that Sam Viering has already taken the liberty to popularize a new nickname for me. For those of you who do not watch South Park, Tweek is a character who is always overcaffeinated and bouncing off the walls. As much as I dislike the nickname Tweek, it is extremely fitting, so I will just accept that in Perth most people will call me that. The man then introduced himself as Sean and was sent to pick me up and bring me to Curtin.

Soon, I was at Curtin University where I saw Sam and Da One and Only, Harry Melendez, kicking it out front of building 599, our program's headquarters, and I couldn't be happier to see some familiar faces. They introduced me to two girls in our program, Atlee and Carly from SMU, and told me that they had talked me up big to the group, so I couldn't disappoint them. Great, I have been here for two seconds and I already had pressure to perform. Next, I went inside to the 599 and Amanda Rickman, one of the directors of the program, showed me around and introduced me to Daniel aka The Best Advisor Ever. Later that night, Dan took myself and the rest of his advisors out to the beach for swimming, beers and fish and chips. In the pub, Carly asked two Aussie locals who seemed to have been there for awhile, which beer to get and they quickly replied, "Tequila!" Although they were on a fast track for a raging hangover in the morning, I took easy as the jet lag was starting to hit me.

Back at my dorm, I was lamenting how cramped and hot it was until I met my roommate, Lindsey Van Clear. She was not only an SMU girl in our program, but she was also roommates back at school with Kristina Theleen, a longtime friend of mine from SF. Immediately, my situation improved exponentially as she offered to make me bed while I showered, making it seem like I lucked out with the greatest roommate. In the morning, I had to sit through one of the most brutal housing orientations. To give you a quick snippet of what it was like, he told a ten minute long story of why driving on the left side of the road was the correct side just to warn us to look the other way when crossing the street. This presentation was followed by a safety one that was similarily aggravating. Once I finished with all those compulsory meetings, our group headed off to Yanchep National Park for a two day retreat. Yanchep is about 50 miles from Perth, a distance that you should remember as it would come into the story on the second night in Yanchep. When the group arrived in Yanchep, we saw our first Kangaroos and Koalas. The Kangaroos were Grey Kangaroos, so they were smaller than the Red Kangaroos, which are the ones that are traditionally thought about seeing in Australia. Nevertheless, these kangaroos were fun to watch as they fought each other, hopped around the premises and tried to act tough when we approached them. The Koalas were much cuter but all they did was chill in the trees, ate and slept- not a bad life. The coolest animal in Yanchep was the Drop Bear. It is a relative of the Koala and hunts by dropping down on its prey from the trees. The only way to prevent being a Drop Bear victim is to rub vegemite, a salty and repulsive Australian black spread, on your face. A few members of the group used this method, which must have worked because we did not run into a Drop Bear the whole time we were there.

The other great thing about being in Yanchep was that all our meals were paid for, all you can eat and delicious. We all took full advantage of this feast and even tried the Kangaroo filets that they made. It tasted like beef but a little gamier. After dinner we had the Australian Olympics, which was like one of the team building games that you played at summer camp when you were like 12. The competitions consisted of Australian Trivia, making the longest strand out of an Australian mint candy wrapper and moving Jaffers, an M&M type candy, from one plate to another with chopsticks. The big finale of these phenomenal games was a relay race where we had to run ten yards, pick up a disgusting vegemite cracker with our mouths and run back. Since it was a competition, my team named the Killer Quokkas of course dominated.