I have arrived!!!!!!

G’Day Mates!!

It’s official I’m in Australia!! The plane ride was pretty killer!! I was fine transferring from MN to Denver then to LA, but the last leg got really long!!! It was about 13 hours and I only slept for maybe 2 of the 13…could not sleep sitting up. The worst part was my butt and back started to kill and my back is still bugging me a bit. On my flight there was a huge group of high school athletes from all over the US that were coming to Australia to play football (American) against Aussies. The whole time in the LA airport and on the plane ride over I could tell they were keeping their eyes on me and surprisingly when we landed in Brisbane one of them approached me and asked me my name and talked to me for a while. Needless to say when he found out I was in collage he made sure to introduce me to the rest of his buddies as “this is Mallory she’s in college”.

I was so excited to find all of my bags had made it to Australia! I was picked up at the airport by someone from the university along with 5 other students attending universities in Brisbane. Two were Badgers that are attending a different “Uni” (that’s what they call universities) in the area but we had fun taunting each other and talking about missing the badger gopher game in the new stadium. I also met a girl from NY, Nicole, who was also going to QUT.

I was dropped off at my apartment at 7:15am and had a lot of time to kill before I could get my keys. Luckily, I ran into a maintenance person who then stored my bags for me in the reception area and I went out to find my first Australian Coffee. My apartment has a coffee shop built right in so I went there and a really nice guy gave me some of the low down about the area and made me my first Australian espresso which is served in a glass not a mug.

9:00am came quick and I checked in and got my keys. I knocked on the door and no one answered so I walked in to find no one. I opened my door and began to unpack when I heard the door next to me open and I met my first roommate Dyani (D-on-e) an Aussie who was here with her boyfriend Troy. I learned that the rest of my roommates also all Aussies were home for the break between semesters and would return soon. Lium, the single male roommate I met soon thereafter and a few days later I met Brittany and still have not met the 4^th, Michelle.

Dyani was great! She had to head to work in the city so she let me tag along to show me where the mall area was so I could go get a pillow, comforter, towels, etc. I went to “target” to get everything; which resembles our Targets in America by the bullseye and types of things they have, but that’s it. After a very long time in target trying to both figure out where everything was and make sure I was getting an ok deal I headed back home on the bus with the biggest reusable tote bag I’ve ever seen that I had to purchase for $2.00.

By the time I got home from Target it was around 4:00 and I was exhausted from Jet leg and starving. I went down the street to our “main street” type of thing and grabbed a Subway….which was interesting ordering. I got up to the counter and since there on metric I didn’t know if they call it a 6 inch or what!!!?? So I ordered a half sandwich to which the sandwich artist looked at me funny, and when I ordered oil on my sub she said ummm….we don’t have that! Oh and here they don’t have $5 footlongs, they have $7. I headed home to eat my sub and watch the Bachelorette in my room. I ended up falling asleep part way through between commercial breaks….5:00pm!!!

The next day I had orientation at 9:15 down on the Gardens Point Campus downtown. I quickly realized how stubborn I really am in being independent after I left at 8:30 to catch my 10 min. bus ride and got lost and arrived half hour late for orientation. I eventually made it there but I couldn’t find the bus stop I needed to go to and for the longest time refused to just ask someone where it was!! But once I arrived orientation went well. I ran into Nicole, the girl I met at the airport and a familiar face and also met Brian, a Florida Gator, who I quickly became close with. I was excited to get all the classes I wanted, a marketing research class, buyer behavior, global business, and an e-marketing class. After orientation me Brian and Nicole headed downtown for our first Australian dinner out at a place called Jo Jos…we got pizza!! Haha

Overall, I made it here safe and slowly I’m getting adjusted and settled. I miss some of the conveniences of home already, but otherwise Australia and Brisbane are gorgeous!

More to come soon!!

-Mallory