Brekkie

"Brekkie": Australian slang for "breakfast."

During the surfing lesson for my Aussie sports class, an instructor was watching me struggling to push myself up on the board. After I failed miserably and nosedived into the wave for the sixth time, he swam over to me.
"You need to eat more brekkie," he said.
"Whugh?" I gurgled, spewing seawater at him.
"If you eat more brekkie, you would have more upper-body strength to stabilize yourself," he said, pointing at my flimsy arms.
"Um, I think I'm just weak."

Wow, where can I begin? A couple of weeks ago, I had my very first surfing experience and realized that I was deplorably lacking in the arm muscles department. Despite the fact that I kept getting pummeled wave after wave, I'm eager to go surfing again and come back to the States considerably more experienced. One of my goals is to be able to successfully ride a whole wave through. >D I also had my first waitressing job last night. It was easier than I expected, but maybe because I working a chinese fast-food joint and not a high-end French restaurant or something. Unfortunately, I realized that I was hired as a casual temporary worker, which means they'll only call me in if someone else calls sick. Damnit... the money reserves are running low.

Letsee, Easter Break stuff... well, due to procrastinative planning, the first night in Brisbane was spent in the airport. Evan, Christine and I found this little alcove-type are underneath an abandoned escalator and camped out there. Though I was able to get a couple of hours in, the others didn't fare so well. I am officially able to sleep anywhere. :D

The next two days were spent at Moreton Bay, which is an island just off the coast of Brisbane. It's smaller than Fraser Island, but still really pretty. The girls and I camped in on the island, snorkeled around some shipwrecks, surfed down some sand dunes (kind of scary at first, but very very fun!) and just bummed around on the beaches. I would say the highlight is definitely the sand dunes and everyone should try it.

We arrived back at Brisbane to meet up with a friend of mine, Nancy, who is going to be studying at Queensland Uni for a year (lucky girl!) Since the original plan of camping at Fraser turned out to be a bust, we decided to rent out a car and road trip up and down the coast. We headed north first, because apparently there was more foresty stuff. Unfortunately, our first night "camping" turned out to be a disaster. The tent Nancy's roommate lent us turned out to be missing poles and picks. It was about as useful as a very large piece of cloth and just as unwieldy (I recorded a video of the girls attempting to tie it to a tree on someone's camera). Luckily, a pair of Aussie boys and this random old man took pity on our misfortune and lent us the proper equipment and help. The rest of our northern excursions were fairly uneventful except at Bundaberg. There, I was able to see baby loggerhead sea turtles hatch out of the sand and crawl into the ocean. Okay, maybe not exactly that. The nest had already been evacuated two days ago, but the park ranger said that sometimes there are late hatchings that got stuck in the sand. Turns out there were - six of them! Watching the ranger dig them out made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, because in the wild, these guys would have died in.

Afterwards, we drove Nancy back to Brisbane so she could study for her exams, and then continued south to see the Gold Coast. We didn't quite get there because we ran out of time, but we did see Surfer's Paradise. Even though it was cloudy and very cold, I could tell that area would have been gorgeous on a sunny day. I definitely need to go back to Brisbane, despite of the face-sized spiders and precocious bushy-tailed possums. Oh, I almost forgot. On my first night in Brisbane, I had left my Swiss pastry roll on the dining room table. It was inside its plastic container, so I thought it would be okay.
I was wrong.
A couple of hours into the night, I was woken by the sound of metal clinking against the dining room table. I sat up from the couch and saw a dark figure hunched over my pastry. I thought it was Nancy's cat, so I yelled at it and waved an arm to scare it off. The creature turned around, and in the murky darkness, I could already tell that it was not Kitty. While I squinted at it and tried to figure out what exactly was on the table, it turned around and continue to eat my pastry. Of course I immediately shot out of my sleeping bag and began to holler at it and make a general hullabaloo. The scary thing was, it wasn't even really intimidated. It would jump off the table, then jump back on and continue to eat my food. I finally ended up throwing a magazine at it (I missed so it was undeterred) and turned on the lights, which did the trick. I turned around just in time to see the end of its bushy tail disappearing through the open window.

Oh, and another thing. It rains INCREDIBLY hard in Australia. I've never seen anything like it in the States. It's even scarier when you're driving through pastureland at night, because you can't see where you're going and the fields are so flat that the roads get flooded. There was a point when I was sitting shotgun and watching the rain fall straight at the windshield. It was like going through hyperspace in Star Wars, except you're in danger of hydroplaning or running over the local wildlife. I'm grateful for friends who are willing to drive on the wrong side of the road, on the wrong side of the car.

One last thing before I end this lengthy entry - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Wow. I finally read the book during the road trip, and all I can say is... wow. In all honesty, I will force my future children to read the Harry Potter books so they can be exposed to the fantasticness that is JK Rowling. I'm still unhappy about the Ginny-Harry pairing though (c'mon, Cho is so much better!) and still in shock about Snape. For me, that was the mini-story that I focused on the most. Poor guy. Nothing is more touching than sacrifices made in the name of unrequited love. That was also one of the reasons why I like the last book best; it's darker and has more realistic themes, not the usual sunshine-and-butterflies that I find annoying in most fantasy novels.

(Oh, and sorry if I ruined the book for anyone...)