it just keeps getting better…

The more time I spend here the more I fall in love with this “little” continent/country. I love everything about it from the weather to the people. The weather is a lovely 85 degrees all day with random showers to cool you off just when you need it. The people are all over the place (obviously) and willing to offer help to you in any way that they can in the most polite way possible. One love. Ha. Anyways, yesterday was a cool day. We went to this rainforest preservation camp where we helped them out in planting trees and fertilizing their plants. We did a bunch of different things for them but Jen, Nanae, Molly and I mainly were working on resoling a lot of the plants, ridding them of their weeds and taking out all the dead plants. I even found a plant that resembled me (tall, dark and handsome of course) It actually turned out to be a lot of fun just going around the nursery talking and screwing around. It started to rain pretty hard when we were there but luckily we were under a tent while the rest of the group was out in the open field planting trees. When that was over we came back and it was pouring balls. For the rest of the night it was raining super hard like hurricane status, not really, but it was hard. We had the brilliant idea of walking a few blocks down to a food place that was undetermined until we saw it and it ended up being Rex Burgers. It was bomb there and we ate outside, soaking wet and it was still like 80 degrees. I love that part. Then we came back to the resort/hostel thingy and we jumped in the pool for an hour. We originally wanted to go into the Jacuzzi but I guess they don’t heat them in the summer time because it is already hot enough. So since it was still super hot outside, we just went swimming in the rain.

Fun fact: When Molly does flips in the pool, her stomach “drops,” explained by her as the feeling you get when you drop on supreme scream. Weird?
Anyways, that’s what we did that night after being burnt out from going out the two nights before and it was chill.

Today was AWESOME. We went to the Rainforestation. It is this place with a mini wild animal park with kangaroo’s and wallabies and crocodiles and koalas and tons of other native Australian animals. They took us on this Indiana Jones-like tour through the rainforest and it was doooope. They showed us all these plants that we shouldn’t touch since they will basically burn our skin for the rest of our life and some green ant nests that are equivalent to the American bee hive. It was a sweet little vehicle too that was used on D-day when whoever the hell stormed the beach in Normandy (or I think that’s what it is called.) Some fool even told me that they took that same vehicle to their prom on the east coast. Hm. After the sweet tour we went and took a picture with a KOALA. AMAZING! It was actually surprisingly heavy and I almost dropped it? But it was sweet and super soft. We also found out how they mate with each other in which they had a very interesting technique. So me and Jen tried it out. Then the aboriginal people showed us a little about their culture and how they hunt and do dances. They were throwing this little skinny bamboo spear super far and hitting the fake tigers in the field. Then they whipped out a real boomerang and threw it and it was crazy. I’ve never seen a real boomerang work. I got a chance at throwing it too but mine didn’t go too far, but non-the-less impressive. :p Next they took us to a stage where they showed us several of their dances that they do and some were quite hilarious. The movements that they do with their legs are kind of like a high speed “jerking” dance. This turns out pretty funny when you see 5 aboriginal men doing it with very serious looks on their faces. During this whole time they were dancing they were making the music with the didgeridoo which is an amazing instrument. It is only a special branch from a tree that is hollowed out with beeswax on the end to save their lips. Then they have to do a funny movement with their lips and tongue to make all these different noises. It is truly an amazing instrument. Then we went to a bomb all you can eat buffet and they had passion fruits, watermelon, honeydew, steak and chow mien. After that we went to the wild animal park where they had kangaroo’s, wallabies, crocodiles, koalas, dingoes, marmots, and other Australian animals. We layed with the kangaroo’s and fed them. The way that kangaroo’s lay down is pretty awesome. They lay down kind of like a human so we all posed just like they did. I secretly wanted the kangaroo to jump up and kick Nanae or Jen but that didn’t happen. They are too nice. But that was basically the end of our two days. Pretty bomb days I must say. Tonight we are eating pizza and just relaxing again. Then tomorrow morning we take off for Surfers Paradise where we are staying for two weeks. Orientation began today, but obviously we are not attending right away. But tomorrow when we move closer to Bond is a TOGA PARTY! Yeahhh. :)