...Then I found one hundred dollars.

Hey everyone! I hope this new installment comes to you on a good day, and if not, hopefully it might cheer you up. Life is still going really well down here and I cannot believe I am in my final 2 months! Time sure does fly when you’re having fun, and with the amount of fun I am having, it comes as no surprise that while I feel like I just arrived in Melbourne yesterday, it has already been 3 months. Better make the next eight weeks count!

Last I left you was a week before Anzac Day. The week leading up to Anzac was regrettably uneventful, or at least I do not remember anything out of the ordinary happening. I probably went to Stolly’s on Tuesday, took a break on Wednesday, you know, the usual. Thursday was Open Mic Night at Glenn and we all headed to the Rec Room to watch the musically inclined strut their stuff on stage. Lots of talent in this small community, let me tell you. Afterward, we headed back into our units and got ready to go to…? Yes, correct. The Eagle. Gosh, you guys are getting really good at this! At the Eagle I was determined to get a pitcher.

“A what?”

“A pitcher.”

“…Pitcha!? A photo!?”

“A JUG!”

“Oi, mate, why didincha say so?”

Such is my life, forgetting to speak Australian at the necessary times. The Eagle was a pretty standard night. No jelly wrestling this time, neither the Jagerettes nor the Jim Beam girls showed up, and I wasn’t splashed with boiling oil…I think I forgot to mention that in my last entry…Usually at the Eagle there is a barbecue fundraiser on Thursdays, for school groups, charities, etc. Well, a few weeks ago, the night of the Jungle Party to be precise, they were using a griddle instead of a grill to cook the snags, and as I was waiting in line to make a charitable donation and collect my snag wrapped in white bread and smothered in tomawto sowce, someone behind the griddle decided to throw a bunch of raw snags on the HOT, GREASY surface and about fifteen droplets of boiling fat and oil splashed all-along my sleeveless arm and shoulder. Ouch is right, my friends! It HURT! They just recently healed, so now I have little white burn scars all up my arm. Could have been worse though. My beautiful face was spared.

As is usual, Friday was extremely low-key, lying somewhere between “sometimes it’s nice to stay in and watch movie” and “please shoot me before I die of boredom.” It’s a nice mix. Luckily I had a lot to look forward to on Saturday, which, by and large started the most INSANE 7 days of my entire time here in Australia. Ladies and gents, please put your seat belts on.

9 am Saturday morning, Kuhloha (formerly Kealoha) and I tramped it to the tram and rode to the Parliament Station, where we met with the cityfolk Danielle, Casey, Alex/Harv, and Kelsey. From there we took the train to the Dandenongs (Say Dandy-nongs), a small mountainous and forested area north east of Melbourne. The train stop we got off is called Ferntree Gully, which we unanimously voted to call Fern Gully instead. As chance would have it, the trail we picked was Anzac themed! How appropriate for Anzac weekend. Every 100 or so meters up the mountain there was a sign detailing our current location as if we were in New Guinea; so it was basically like we were soldiers on a trek during WWII in the tropics of New Guinea. Pretty cool. It certainly felt tropical, what with the warm temperature, pouring rain and ferns everywhere. Covered in sweat and rainwater, we made it to the top in about an hour, breaked for lunch, and then began our descent down a different trail. This new trail was a bit steep to say the least, so we ended up running down it for a good portion, and reached the bottom in about 15 minutes. Not too shabby.

After that we headed back to the city and hung out for the rest of the afternoon at the girls’ apartment, showered and then headed to the MCG! The MCG is the Melbourne Cricket Ground, a large oval-shaped, open air arena that hosts a number of, yes, cricket matches, but more importantly, footy matches! Kuhloha and I sprung some free tickets through La Trobe Uni’s International office, and so we treated ourselves and our Californian friends to a free match. Melbourne was playing Brisbane (Say Bris-bin…I’m telling you, it’s a different language), which was supposedly an ‘alright’ match-up. It was also the day before the Anzac match, the biggest match of the season aside from the Grand Final, and so it wasn’t terribly crowded. Lots of empty seats in the 100,000 capacity stadium. Melbourne ended up SMASHING Brisbane, which was awesome, and Melbourne supporters were ecstatic! Not that people barrack their home teams fairly often; rather you pick any team you like, and support them for life, whether they’re awful or really good (barrack, not to be confused with Mr. President Obama, is to support a team. Example, Harnzy barracks the Pies [meaning the Collingwood Magpies]. You do not say ‘root for.’ Root has a very different meaning in Aussie English. It means to know someone…in the Biblical sense).

The issue with the ‘support your home-team’ mentality is that in the Melbourne area alone there are nine teams; ten if you include Geelong (last time I said this is pronounced Jah-long…I have now heard Jee-long as well, so you know, to each his own). In the AFL (Australian Football League) there are 16 teams. The remaining six teams are the two in Perth, two in Adelaide, one in Sydney, and one in Brisbane. To put it into perspective, this would be like San Francisco, the Marina, the Sunset, the Richmond, Menlo-Atheron, Burlingame, Marin, Daly City, San Mateo, San Jose, The Upper East Side of Manhattan, Long Island, Orlando, Disney World, Chicago, and Seattle being the teams of the NFL. Outrageous, right? It’s because footy is enormously popular in Victoria specifically. Rugby is much more popular in New South Wales. But yea, people barrack whomever they want, BUT you cannot change. Once you pick the North Melbourne Roos, you’re a Roo for life, lest you be jeered at the remainder of your life for riding the band wagon.

We left the MCG and headed out into the chilly night back to the apartment to start the night right with some goon and juice, and some Pure Blondes. Somewhere between the sipping and the laughing, we decided to purchase concert and plane tickets. $30 to see LMFAO rock out in a private venue, and $48 one way to Brisbane. Great success. We left the apartment, caught the tram to Bourke Street, stepped off, and…wait for it…FOUND ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS IN COLD, HARD, CASH. All credit goes to Casey. Well sort of. When we had first gotten off the tram, Casey wanted to go right; however, two American blokes we met one the tram were heading to the same place as us (the Carlton Club), and they insisted it was left. To settle the matter, we asked a nice lady cop. Left it is! So, really, credit for finding that $100 goes to the cop. We got to the Carlton Club but were denied entry because we weren’t on the guest list…I have never been to the Carlton, but Kuhloha tells me its ‘filled with 40 year olds.’ Apparently to get in you must be either on the guest list, or over the hill. Maybe both? No worries though, we ditched the other Americans and headed to the Deck, a trendy place only a few blocks away. Danielle wanted to get some “classy cocktails” since we found the $100, but when we got there I involuntarily yelled JAGERBOMBS! Classy, for sure. We bought Danielle a Long Island though to keep her happy. So that took care of about half our new-found fortune, and the rest of the night we opted for pots (remember what a pot is? Standard size of beer…come guys, keep up).

The night was really fun, great music, I tried YET AGAIN to start up an electric slide when they played Sweet Home Alabama, but alas, to no avail. People just watched, probably out of jealousy and wonder. We also did some swing dance, and people watched again. This time probably just out of jealousy. We were also clearly underdressed. Especially me, in denim, a plaid flannel, and Casey’s shoes (Casey is 6’3 and prob size 13. I know it’s been awhile since you’ve all seen me, but I am just a bit smaller than that). Oh well, we got in and out without issue. Actually getting out was a bit of an experience. Some girl handed me her breezer and said ‘Happy Birthday!’ and then some guy, yelled HAPPY BIRTHDAY and gave me a peck on the cheek. Then Kuhloha goes, “Oh! It’s his TWENTY FIRST!” What did that get me? Yes. A peck on the lips. Thanks mate…sorry I forgot to shave. So after that I just about downed the breezer (waste not!), and we headed out and everyone laughed at Tim for getting kissed by a dude. Ha. Ha. Ha. Very funny.

After the Deck we made the executive decision to stay out all night. Why? Well, we wanted to go see the Dawn Service at the Shrine of Remembrance, which was commencing at 6am. It was already 2:30 and didn’t want to risk over-sleeping. So we headed to Crown Casino to lose money, I mean gamble. I decided it was fair to put in $20 since I had gotten at least that much in free drinks at the Deck; I was up $10 at one point, and then it was just all downhill from there. Paul our dealer was just not on my side that night. I cashed in my $5 chip with my head held low, and then we marched outside behind a very cranky Harv. After sitting for a few minutes outside the casino, letting our feet hang over the Yarra, we decided to move on and grab some food. We walked up Swanston to Pie Face, a 24 hour pie eatery. Not dessert pie, meat pie. They are friggen GOOD AS. Lamb and rosemary is my personal favorite. They get their name from the fact that they draw a smiley face on each pie, which are about the size of a large muffin. Anyways, we filled up on Pie Face and then continued on our trek to the apartment to grab coats and jackets. Once there, we got bundled up and waited outside for the tram to pick us up and take us to the Shrine.

For 5:15am, the tram was PACKED. We had to stand, unfortunately, but the Shrine is only 15 minutes away, so it wasn’t too bad. We disembarked and journeyed with the other pilgrims up the hill to the Shrine which already had a sizable crowd gathered in front of it. The Shrine, by the way, is huge, very majestic; basically, it’s the Parthenon. The hundreds of people were completely silent, and so monkey-see-monkey-do, we stood quietly, trying desperately not to fall asleep. Soon enough the ceremony started. The audio was beyond understandable, and all I caught was the Anzac slogan (Lest We Forget) after everything they said, and a reading of John McCrae’s poem, ‘In Flander’s Field,’ which I still know by heart from Ms. Z’s 8^th grade poetry project. As the first rays of sunlight shed their golden beams onto the crowd, the ceremony ended and we headed across the street to the park for a free (donations encouraged) Anzac breakfast. I contributed a $2 coin; can’t say the same for the 3 ugly Americans with me…(yes, at this point we had lost Danielle; she fell victim to her bed after the Deck). After some eggs, beans, snags, coffee, tea, and Anzac cookies, we took a nice stroll down to the Yarra and slept in the sun until the start of the parade. After seeing a bunch of old men in their uniforms, some old cars, and getting accidentally bashed in the head by a bagpiper (it hurt, not gonna lie), I was a bit over the parade. After collecting our stuff from the apartment, Kuhloha and I sat at Bourke and Elizabeth for the 86 tram to go back to the hood. Please go to the dictionary and look up ‘hot mess;’ you should find our picture there. We looked god awful, but it was good practice because we have since taken the ‘tram ride of shame’ 3 more times.

Once back in Bundoora, Glenn was still serving brunch. Famished, I sat and ate. Everyone asked me where I was going that day (I was wearing two jackets, the free footy scarf I got at the game, sunglasses, tennis shoes, and had my backpack). I left my answer at, “Oh, I just got back from the Dawn Service.” They loved that. Good on ya, Timmy! The rest of the day was spent, yes, napping. Monday was a school holiday, and to be truthful, my only sober day of the week. Sorry mom. We went to the mall to buy art supplies for making t-shirts for the LMFAO concert on Thursday, and spent the better half of the day making stencils and painting our shirts.

Tuesday was, shockingly, a Stolly’s night. Wednesday was Sheds, which, I’m not sure if I talked about it, but Sheds is when we go to the footy oval on campus and have a party in the footy clubhouse aka shed. There are cheap drinks and a DJ and its cold and muddy and just a lot of fun. Afterward, Kealoha and I inevitably (this happens every night we go out) got into a political argument with Australians. Whether it be on the Aboriginal issue, or Australian history and global involvement, we always manage to get into very interesting, and probably nonsensical, debates. Finally Thursday came and after spending the day in class, I was ready for some LMFAO. The concert was in St. Kilda, a neighborhood/suburb of Melbourne, where it so happens our fellow Californian Kelsey now lives. So we all met up at her place, cracked out some glowsticks (and glow glasses!!), deflated a goon bag, and walked a few blocks down to the Prince Band Room. We were about 2 hours early, wanting to make sure we got a good spot on the floor. Well, we were in luck. Literally 10 people were in there. So we passed the time by dancing like idiots in front of the gathering crowd. You could not miss us on the floor. Not only were we the only eight people dancing, we were also GLOWING in our fluorescent clothing, bracelets, and glasses. Lots of jealous onlookers, let me tell you. Finally the opening act took stage. They call themselves “OH SNAP” … Oh snap, indeed. Nothing gets the crowd going more than two tubby white guys in track suits wearing sunglasses and breathlessly shouting nonsense into the microphones… Eventually they ended their act and LMFAO came out onto stage.

To say the concert was INSANE would be a complete understatement. It was unbelievable. For those that do not know, LMFAO is a male duo and records what they call “party rock.” Their songs are all about drinking, partying, picking up, and such. A good representation of them would be some of their song titles, which include “Shots,” “I am not a Whore,” and “I’m in Miami Bitch.” You get the idea. (Note: They have since released an album titled “I’m in Your City.” There are fifty tracks on it, all identical save the title city. Favorites are Miami, LA, The Bay, and Chattanooga. Yes, Chattanooga). Anyways, they start off the show by taking shots of Patron (tailgate anyone?) on stage and then screaming “I’M IN MELBIN BITCH!” Well, we just about peed our pants with excitement. They played all their big hits in between talking to the audience, taking shots, pulling girls up on stage, showering the audience with beer and champagne, and waterfalling Grey Goose, Belvedere, and Patron into the mouths of those close enough to the stage. Yes, I was among the fortunate. And props to Harv for being the first chica on stage!!

The concert came to an end, and we hiked through St. Kilda back to Kelsey’s apartment and grabbed a MaxiTaxi back into the city. Us hoodrats had the intention of taking the Night Rider bus back to Bundoora, but alas, it only runs in the wee small hours of the morning on Saturday and Sunday, and it was only Friday. So we settled for some Maccas and then walked up to the girls’ apartment on Swanston, which we found out as we were walking by, is next door to a brothel. How did we find out? A patron entered as we walked by. He stepped past the door, held open by the busty Madame of the house, into a neon red interior, and as he passed by, she said in a very practiced, sultry tone, “welcome to the Manhattan Terrace.” I know staring is rude, but we all took full advantage of the situation and gawked until the door closed firmly behind the Madame. We made it up to the high-rise apartment, and slept quite soundly for a few hours.

After waking up, Kuhloha and I skipped down the block to the tram and completed our second ride of shame for that week (third to come soon). Friday was a very chill day, and all the international students had an event that night. So we went into the Glenn dining hall and made small talk with all the other internationals and the Aussie student leaders (RAs), who had been forced to come. Much to our surprise, there was BOTTLED wine. Quite nice. Dinner was a bit lack-luster, as is usual for the Glenn dining hall. After eating, we played a bunch of different games. I volunteered to go first for my team, and out of a German, Swede, Russian, and Indian, I drew the best map of Australia! Go Team America! I won a jar of Vegemite. Haha, score. After some more games, everyone had to go up and sing their national anthem; the five Americans present did awesome, but the girls from Singapore were CRAZY GOOD! Be proud Alvin, if you’re reading this haha.

Saturday night Kuhloha and I met up with Casey in the city to check out Perseverance (known as Persa to the Aussies), a small venue that traditionally plays pop, classic rock, etc…music you know and can sing along to, aka my kind of music. We also almost got into a pretty intense fist fight on the tram when some douchebags asked us if we like Osama bin Laden, but that’s a story for another day. At Persa, I knew EVERY song that played, some notables include “Jesse’s Girl,” “You Belong With Me,” “Don’t Stop Til You Get Enough,” and “You Shook Me All Night Long.” It was a top night! Afterward we found a bustling Greek shop and got ourselves some souvlaki, which is basically a Greek burrito (there are Greeks EVERYWHERE in Melbourne; huge immigrant community, kebabs and souvlaki shops are a dime a dozen). With full bellies we headed back to Casey’s place where we took a nice 4 hour nap before Kuhloha and I made our third ride of shame of that week back to the hood. We are total pros now, by the way.

The next week was pretty quiet. Wednesday was the study abroad fair at La Trobe and I volunteered to work the American booth. Not too many people showed up, but Jenna (San Diego), Rachel (Wash DC) and I gave some really great advice to all the Aussies that came to our table. Good advice such as: go to California. To be honest, Aussies are deathly afraid of the cold, and the last thing I want on my conscience is sending some poor bloke to the middle of Wisconsin. We definitely talked up Washington state and Northeast as well, so it wasn’t all one sided. Wednesday also happened to be Cinco de Mayo, which, if you can believe it, is not celebrated in Australia. My Cinco de Mayo was spent at Danielle and Alex’s apartment (next to the Manhattan Terrace) planning our three week road trip we’re going to take after finals. We’ll be flying into Brisbane and driving round trip from there up to Cairns (say Cans), roughly the distance from Santa Barbara to Seattle and back. Yikes is right! Lots of driving, but plenty of pit stops and excursions are in the plans. Cannot wait!

The next day was dormal (dorm + formal), the annual Glenn Ball. It was in North Fitzroy, one of the burbs north of Melbourne, at a nice reception hall. Dinner + open bar + dance floor = recipe for success. Our table was miraculously situated next to the bar, and every time Marla the Waitress passed by she brought us more beer/wine/champagne/jugs of mixed drinks; by far the best service I have ever experienced. Hands down. Dinner started with a pumpkin soup (they LOVE pumpkin here. Pureed, steamed, baked, in salad, lasagna, pasta, crepes, etc. You know what they don’t have? Pumpkin pie. Go figure.), followed by the standard “chicken or beef” main course, and a desert tray. The dance floor was off and poppin’ soon enough and I learned the Aussie version of the electric slide! FINALLY! It’s called the Nutbush Dance. It’s okay to laugh, I did too. Remind me to teach you all. It’s sick as.

The rest of the week was pretty quiet. I went into the city to the Queen Victoria Market, a huge outdoor farmer’s market downtown. That was a lot of fun. After that I went and saw a movie with some friends at Hoyts, basically the Century Theater group down under. We saw Date Night (Steve Carrel and Tina Fey)…highly recommended. Funny as. Sunday was Kelsey’s 21^st, but we were all kind of sick haha so it was a fairly quiet night. We got some pizza, had some goon and then walked down to her local pub, the Hotel Barkly. She got a martini for “free.” It technically wasn’t free since the owner made her sing karaoke in front of everyone (a sizable crowd of about 50 people). At least she could pick the song (Cher’s “Do You Believe in Life After Love”); though with her laryngitis, it probably wasn’t the wisest decision.

That pretty much brings us to here. It’s a cold day, and I have been listening to Christmas music, cooped up inside with a cough. It’s okay to think me strange, I do too. Missing Stolly’s is never a great thing, but I would rather be rid of this cold, so it looks like a movie night! … Unless I can be persuaded. Lord, I am a sucker for peer pressure. I hope everyone is doing well back home!

Aussie-isms

Adding ‘as’ to adjectives. Example: funny as, sick as, good as, shit as. (its pronounced azzz, not asss). Basically it means ‘really’ or ‘very.’ Probably derived from people saying ‘oh, it’s good as gold’ or ‘funny as a clown,’ but has since been shortened to just ‘as.’ It can be a bit confusing at first. You find yourself asking the person, “good as ‘what,’ mate?”

At a dinner, tapas/hors d'oeuvres are called appetizers, soup/salad is called the entrée, and the main course is called the main.

“You little ankle biter/ripper/vegemite” means ‘child.’

Chewie = gum

Fairy floss = cotton candy

Trackies = sweatpants

Heaps = a lot. Can also be similar to the Northern Californian word ‘hella.’ For example, “Yea there were heaps of people there” or “Yea, it was heaps fun!”

Add-id-ass = Adidas. They pronounce the ‘I’ like in ‘it’

Tall poppy syndrome = if you have tall poppy syndrome, you are a cocky SOB (son of a female dog). The origin comes from the fact that in a field, the tall poppy is the one with its neck sticking out, and is likely to get its head chopped off. You do not want to be the tall poppy.

Skeleeetal = skeletal. They do, however, pronounce skeleton correctly.