Brisbane and the Gold Coast and the Hostels along the way

Welcome back to college park everyone- kegs are to the right, cups are at the door, and to find the bathrooms look for the line with 20 girls with their legs crossed and cell phones out. That is the scene that most of you young men and women will be seeing in a few short days. Sorry to say I will be absent from that scene, as I will also be missing the first dozen or so happy hours of the fall semester, but g’d bless my sling box and brother-in-law for setting it up, because the one thing I will not miss is Terrapin and Redskin Football. However as I have clearly outlined there will be several missed facets of my life for the duration of my abroad study, but lets take a look at what the other 5.98 billion people in the world will be missing out on (for you non geography/math double majors, that would be 6 billion world population - 21 million people in Australia=5.98 billion, however I am marketing/logistics so my calculations could be massively off).

So this past week was the MOST incredible thus far. While it was absolutely amazing to have my parents over here and have them take me to Sydney and be able to show them around Melbourne, this weekend was filled with my first independent traveling excursion. It was eye opening to travel around some of the different places in Australia and be able to meet new people, go to new nightclubs, and experience all of the things Australia has to offer. So almost immediately after we got back from Sydney I went to classes and did some laundry and went out one night, but before you know it, I was in a taxi headed to the airport yet again. So after landing on Tuesday, my friends Joy, Thomas, Veronica, Brianne, and Joy’s friend from home Brianna, all headed to the airport together en route to the capital of Queensland and the city of hostels, backpackers, and the Red Bull International Break Dancing competition, Brisbane.\

After arriving at the airport, Thomas and I made a few attempts to secure the attractive attendant behind the check in counter’s number, but then we realized joking about carrying on weapons of mass destruction (referring to our biceps of course) was not an appropriate joke. So after being fondled by Senior Cruz in the back room of the security room, we walked out of the gate and onto the tarmat to make it onto a 60 person plane. BTW Australian airports have some of the most lenient security rules if you fly domestically, so even if my flirting attempts did include references to nuclear bombs, a quick pat down probably wouldn’t have even been necessary; just ask Joy who got checked in w/o any name, ID, or indication that she was in fact Joy Somers.

After the flight we land in Brisbane at about midnight and don’t get to the hostel until 12:30. Keep in mind that we never actually received confirmation that this hostel had space, because apparently we needed to call ahead 24 hrs in advance to confirm our visit… and considering it was already 12:30am when we got to the place, we had about a 50% chance of sleeping on the streets that night. Fortunately the place was open, and hoppin’. Right next door was ‘Birdie YumYum’- a night club in Brisbane that had a hot tub, pool, 4 lounges, and an outdoor dance floor. With capacity at about 500 and 3 private gazebo’s for VIPs, it was the worlds coolest dace-club/hostel I’ve seen since eurotrip where they stayed in a 5 star for $.06 in Bratislava. But that night we hit the night club for a few hours, come back around 2 and crash for the night. Wake up 5 hrs later and get dressed in 15 minutes on our way to ‘The Australian Zoo,’ home to the late Steve Irwin and all the croc’s that are still pissed at him.

The Australia Zoo was everything it’s cracked up to be. We walked around, saw a crazy crocodile feeding show, got Thomas involved as a live bird stand, and fed an elephant. There are plenty of pictures online and I suggest you give em a good look through. As my new facebook picture indicates, I even got to hold a furry koala as it clenched onto my shoulder in fear of becoming instinct. After the zoo we bussed back to the hostel about an hour away for some more good times and drunken behavior. We first stopped off at a grocery store and believe me, you can live a lot longer than you think you can on just peanut-butter sandwiches, and tim tams. But they are delicious so we made the exception. Thomas and I hit up the hot tub while the girls got ready and went out. When we got back 2 hours later and full of pruney fingers, the girls were gone but we got together and killed a bottle of bicardi and hit the club. We went to the same club as the first night, but this night was a hellova lot better. We mingled with the crowd for a while, Thomas found a nice 40-yr old couple and made friends as I talked to the other bar-goers that are still unable to rent a car in the US. That night was the international break dancing competition sponsored by Red Bull so that was absolutely INSANE! We snapped some pictures, and one of the guys was wearing a Celtics hat so we started the U-S-A! chant over and over until some burley looking aussies suggested that we shut the hell up- so we killed some beers and watched the rest of the show. Afterwards Thomas made some sexy passes at the girls to the left of the stage and after swinging and missing about 5 times, Mr. Red Bull came back into the picture and asked the lady if she needed any help… That’s when Thomas leaves the night and is only to be heard from several hours later, sporting a pair of sexy English bixers. But after he left to “go to the bathroom” aka throw up on himself naked, I found my way talking to 5 girls from Brisbane in the VIP gazebo w/ the other Reb Bull contestants. We killed a few pictures, had some questionable girl on girl dancing scenes and then I went back to the dancefloor looking for Thomas, only to find the girls on their trip back from their bar hopping adventures. We then headed back to the room to find a cool Irishman and his girlfriend as our new neighbors, and Thomas sprawled out on Brianna’s bed in nothing but boxers. So Brianna got into Thomas’s bed to sleep as I went with Veronica and Brianne to watch Dumb and Dumber in the TV room. When I came back 4 hrs later after falling asleep in the tv room, Thomas was discovered bottomless sleeping inside the covers and Brianna outside confused and scared. I don’t think anyone knows how the boxers came off or how he came to be in 2 beds that night w/o waking everyone else up, but that’s the wonderful moments of being in a hostel.

The next day we were all set to wake up bright and early again to go to Wine Country. A day to be filled with my least favorite alcohol, actually turned out to be an amazing day. So Brianna, Joy, Thomas and I all decided to drop $140 for the excursion which proved to be more than worth it. It started with us being picked up in front of our hostel at around 9am and we headed off in a Mini van to a small town in between the gold coast and Brisbane. We had the most amazing scones in the world with some great Jelly, which Brianna horted all to herself as I was left to fend for myself and lick some off the floor. Thomas and I then walked around town and found the worlds first fudge shop restricted to those 18 years of age and older. Liquor and fudge make for a fun idea, but idk how good that would actually be in practice. We then ventured into a shop filled with lonely housewives and the cute nick nacks that keep them entertained. There were napkins that sported witticisms that challenge the facebook bumperstickers for their sexual innuendos and dorky sayings like “the difference between men and cooking is after I do all the work I’m actually full with food,” and “Sometimes I like looking cheap,” don’t worry, I thought of all my sorority girl friends while in that shot- I think you know who you are. After that we went to a german coo coo clock store and say some 14,000+ german coo coo and grandfather clocks, that were unbelievably worth the cost—sooo cool. Then finally we went to the winery.

A solid 30 minutes away and chit chatted with the drive of this mini van along the way. Got there took a few swigs, took down some notes to impress all the ditry girls of college park that are used to port royal rum and coke and zelko and sprite. And as surprised as I was, the 2004 Dry Reisling was light, fruity with a crisp aftertaste and landed a 5/5 on my score sheet, so I dropped $16.50 for a bottle of wine, the MOST I thought I would ever spend on wine, until the next winery that we went to. I hated 70% of the wines, but the 2003 Botyrtis, a crisp dessert wine w/ a light fruity after taste was good enough to drop $20 on and will hopefully impress an aussie lady along the way- but prolly not since they all want aussie dudes, and even the Americans all want aussie dudes…. Guess I’m SOL-so then I’m stuck to impressing the cute jewish girls of college park. OH! And at that winery there was a 30^th birthday party for some random person and she had a group of 20 people all dressed up in crazy wigs- there was a homer and marge couple, a weird 80s mullet couple, and some freaks and geeks if I ever saw them. We then grabbed a nice lunch and learned about our tour guides MySpace habbits and how she met her last 2 boyfriedns there… they didn’t work out? SHOCKED…

We went to the last winery on our tour and before we were done we went on a ‘Glow Worm’ tour. These guys are little maggets with a light on their ass to attract fly larva to eat them and are no longer than a millimeter. It was creepy but very cool. The cave we were in to view them was man made b/c these glow worms are supposedly endangered… guess people really do try and protect all animals/insects, as weird and unusual as they are. We headed back, got a nice nap in the car, then headed back to the hot tub for some great relaxation and then went to the bar for maybe an hr and called it a night. We were off to the Gold Coast the next morning at 7am so figured we’d be good little hostel goers and stay in. Also there were some cool kids from Germany staying in our hostel so we/Brianne annoyed them with overly personal questions about their travels and sexual escapades.

We left the next morning, almost missed our connection b/c the bus guy gave us the wrong pick up spot, but we ran for a train and caught the main bus from the Brisbane transit center and were off to the Gold Coast. As soon as we got to the hostel, another sweet place w/ some good ol bunk beds, we undressed and headed straight for the beach. Walked along the beach for a while pursuing the place where Brianna was getting surfing lessons, which turned out to be a solid 2 miles away, but it was a nice day on the beach so I got no complaints. We got there after Thomas collected a few dozen shells, set up shop and I got some lunch, Thomas went into the 50 degree water, brianne sun tanned, and veronica and joy went to get some coffee. As we watched Thomas splash around we finally decided to play some paddle ball which I stole form the hostel. In a moment of frustration that the paddle ball was not going well, we decided to just throw stiff at each other, except I took it too far and chucked mine into the wind and hit some asian guy in the crotch. He took it surprisingly well and I apologized profusely, but still it was pretty humorous. We then were doing poses in the sand and wanted to get one of us all jumping up and down so we asked some dutch/Italian girls to take our picture. They did and we ended up talking for over an hr and getting some names to facebook stalk them later. We played a USA vs Intl’ soccer game and clearly the USA dominated in the not so Olympic games. We stayed there until about 5 and then came back, went to get some peanut butter and bread, some raymen noodles, and then headed back to the hostel. Had a pizza dinner for $4 a person and watched mr. and mrs. Smith in the hostel’s tv room/bar. We drank some booze, this time it was jim beam and coke and headed on the hostel courtesy shuttle into town. Got a free drink and admit into the bar by going w/ the hostel, and as soon as we got there we noticed us, and a bridal shower where the only groups there. So we hung out w/ our new friend from London, Molly, and daced the night away to jitter bug, greace lightening, and JT all night long. Hit up a live music pub on the way back and then got a cab and headed home around 2am.

The next morning we went ZORBING! Soooooo amazing! We got intoa giant plastic bubble filled w/ water and rolled down a hill. The whole thing lasted for no more than 15 seconds but it felt like 5 minutes and was so good we had to do it again. Got some great pictures and videos, and the guy liked us enough to be human speed bumps. I believe he said that they are no longer allowed to do that again because the last guy who did it ruptured their spleen….. so THANKS! But its cool, it was a killer on my ankles but a blast to be a part of. Coat me $55 for the 2 runs and totally worth it. We got dropped off at a bus stop at dream world (a much shittier 6 flags) of the gold coast and then came back. Changed our clothes and then Thomas, Joy and I walked into town and grabbed dinner at the Hard Rock, Gold Coast for dinner. Another great meal and to finish it we killed the jim beam playing alcoholic war- you drink everytime you loose war, it gors by fast. We pregamed this place called Infinity. SOOO SWEET! It’s a massive light mirror maze with a giant ball pit in the middle full of 20 exercise balls and a stobe light. Lots of fun but lots of potential for broken clavicles… but still lots of fun. The staff was monitoring us in the last few rooms because we created our own techno music video in one of the rooms. Again sooo sweet. After the infinty club, it soon dawned on us that that was our last night on vacation. So we took our then soberd selves back to the hostel, watched Zoolander for the 2^nd time that night, and fell asleep and had high hopes for the next day.

We all ‘coupled off’ the next day. Thomas and Joy rented mopeds and drove around the city. Veronica and Brianna rented a car and drove to a ropes course, and due to my parents severe accident in Bermuda on mopeds 6 yrs ago, I avoided that, and because of my ropes course experience w/ alpha sig last year, I felt that was no longer a necessary experience, so Brianne and I walked into town. We took about a 2 mile walk into the other side of town, stopped off at a park, went on the see-saw and an vertical tetter totter, thee swins, a cool waterfall, and then headed towards the mall. I was still without a good pair of shoes and was craving to see a movie, so I bought some shoes at foot locker and then headed to the theatre to see ‘Taken.’ Better than Bourne and almost as good as 24. Ended the movie, walked back after taking a cat nap on the ground, walked along the beach, developed the famous “Mitch and Brianne’s DAY OF FUN”- making people jealous since 2008…and then we grabbed a sandwich and cup of noodles at a convince store, watched the Olympics and met up with everyone else and made it back to the airport.

Sad to say but this trip was over. It was a lot of fun getting to know everyone better and develop our core group even more. Coming back was a culture shock. Went to classes, went out one night, but more importantly, coming back I had by far my worst low. I missed everyone back home throughout, but I was having too much fun to really get upset about it. This past week I just hit a wall after being back from vacation and realizing that I had 3 more months here. I knew I was having fun, and doing things here that I would not have the opportunity to do every again, but my friends from back home, and especially my family were no longer physically there to give me to security I wanted. So I spoke to some friends back home, and others that have been abroad, and of course my family and I finally came to realize that having such high expectations of only being happy with nonstop fun was a lofty and unreasonable expectation. I had a very secure feel of my life back home, and it was beginning to slip away the unexpected course of action that my life was taking the form of here. So after a weird night of going out and thinking to myself, wow, how sweet would cornerstone be right now, I snapped the hell out of it. I needed that tho, just to realize that not every moment will be a blast, but while I am here I am enjoying myself, I am doing things that I could never do back home, and I am meeting new people. The people here are what has kept me so happy. Being unpredictable and breaking out into song at parties and taking over the dace floors, and grabbing dinners with, or staying in and watching the Olympics with, there are always ways to pass the time when you have good people around you. However there is severly more down time here, because I am overly active back at school w/ fraternity life, the AMA, ABA, tour guide, the jew scene, pong in commons, concerts, trips to NY, and all of my groups of friends, a night full of good times is never far off. Here there are far fewer people, a non-existant campus, and no family near by. So the down time can be rough, but only when I think to myself that I should be getting drunk every night and sleeping on the floor with my clothes off. This is one of those experiences where the more I learn about myself the more this trip was worth it. And right now, this trip has far in exceeded expectations. So I celebrated a birthday, went to my friends bar, and watched the Olympics the rest of the week and began to fully appreciate my time here. Shit, writing this I really do love it here. Thanks to everyone here and back home who made me realize that.

Next week I am going to Cobbs Harbour, Frazier Island, The Rainforest, back to Brisbane, the gold coast and Sydney, and then off to the Whitsunday Islands on the Great Barrier Reef… all for $700 and a great 9 day spring break. I will keep everyone updated and make sure to stay posted.

Oh and btw- my sister Michelle and her husband Marc and their Kids Jonah. Maya, and Ava are officially MOVING TO MARYLAND! I heard about this over the past week and CANNOT stop thinking about it! I am so excited to get back and see them all just a short drive away in Bethesda. Could not be more excited and I will talk to you guys soon.

Keepin it real down under,

Kangaroo Mitch

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Week 3-4.5 Its been a Month what have I missed?

How ya goin mate? Typical Aussie lingo at its best.

So it’s officially been one month since my departure from BWI and arrival in Melbourne. I’m not gonna say that I haven’t looked back, because I fucking love college park. I ultimately decided to come here because I was very confident back home and always had a lot of fun, but until I decided to put myself in a completely new environment, I really didn’t know how I would survive.

This Blog is as much for me, as it is for my friends and family back home. So while it may seem rather unusual to speak so candidaly of my abroad emotions and my nostalgic sense for rugged warehouse and the Mitchell building, I want to remember what it was like being here. I felt a little bit uncomfortable when the guy in assless chaps and a mesh shirt was mocking me for buying a journal at the hallmark store, so I decided this was a better forum to document my time here, and hopefully when I look through my notes in 6 months, 5 years, or when Im 50, I’ll be able to recall exactly what was going through my mind.

Now back to current life. So last time I made an entry, my parents had just gotten to Melbourne and we went to the beach, on a tour of the coast, a few markets, met up w/ some old friends from the states, and did a bunch of other random events. The same holds true for this entry, however the setting is a bit different.

So my parents left the city Monday morning and they went off to Cairns. Cairns is right on the Great Barrier Reef and is according to them, amazing. Plenty of places to see nemo, and what is considered the best scuba diving site in the world. However since I won’t be there for a few more months, I’ll stick to Melbourne. Right after they left I was feeling more nostalgic than I had been since I got here. I was really happy to be back and spend time w/ my friends, but it was definitely a nice change to have them around and have the ½ comfort of home and the ½ excitement of being over seas. It was a nice change of pace, but they were coming back to get me 4 days later so it wasn’t too much of a hindrance.

The week after they left we celebrated our friend Veroinca’s (from Rowen University) 19th Birthday- she’s one of 2 sophomores here and the youngest that Ive met down here. Despite this 19 is still very much legal and we hit up a few bars and an Italian restaurant to celebrate. The rest of the week was fairly relaxing. Went to the bars Tuesday night, chilled Wednesday, and then Thursday afternoon my parents landed back in Melbourne after their stay in Carins. I crashed at their hotel that night to make sure I made the 8am flight to Sydney; however we had the University of Melbourne exchange student gala that night. Before the Gala I took my parents to a bar in downtown Melbourne which overlooked thee Yara river and had pretty decent bar food. I took off around 6:30 to change and left them w/ the bill and some free time to do whatever the hell you do when you leave a bar after your 50 years old-don’t say it, don’t even think it, they went to the movies.

Our friend Joy’s friend from ASU Brianna has been in town so she went to the gala with us, and while she made it to 1130 after being thrown out by the bouncer for falling asleep on the couch in the bar and then vomiting all over herself, I was surprisingly restraintful and held in my liquor. 3 hours, a $30 cab ride, and a mushroom and bacon pizza later, I made it back to my parents hotel room, wasted at 3AM. I took off my pants, fell onto the couch, and the next thing I know I’m downing water at 6AM with my mom telling me “I’m glad you got a hangover, maybe now you wont be an underaged alcoholic”- thanks mommy!

So we headed off to Sydney on Friday morning, and wouldn’t get back until Wednesday morning. With no classes on Monday or Friday, it was doable to miss only 1 day of classes (3 day week w/ a 4 day weekend, its cool, you can be jealous)….. (but I do have fucking macro econ 2 on Tuesdays so I had to skip my class Wednesday night to go to macro 2, because that shit is impossible). So we land in Sydney and go to check into our hotel, but we got there an hr early so instead we grabbed some lunch next to the hotel, and then made our way to the world famous Sydney Harbor. Sydney is an amazing city. Very beautiful and scenic, and also very toruisty. Both Melbourne are very expensive, but that’s about it for the similarities. Sydney is the LA of Austrelaia, and Melbourne is the San Fransisco, only with more straight bars, in fact Sydney is the gay capital of Australia…. So its all very confusing. However what I’m getting at is Melbourne has great culture, fine dining, great shopping, and the best night life in the southern hemisphere. However Sydney has the better sights, more souvineer shops, and the high rise buildings- oh and some fat aboriginal guys playin digiridoos on the street corner.

So on Friday we toured the harbor, walked around, and grabbed dinner in Darling harbor. It was a great day and very nice to be back w/ my parents. On Saturday we got our energy back and toured the world famous Sydney Opera House. I learned all about the history, the 18 year delays and millions and millions in budget adjustments, and how the government eventually forced the architect to retire and he has never been back since, but the building itself was very cool. Nothing amazing, but worth seeing none the less. After that, we went to the aquarium. Got to see Nemo and his friends, a sunbathing crocodile, fierce sharks, and a lot of other random animals. That was also very cool, but nothing compared to Sunday. On Sunday we booked this tour with an off roading ‘truck’ that had coach bus-like seating, but drove like a hummer. Our first stop was going to the featherdale wildlife park. This place was the best part of the trip to Sydney, by FAR. I got to feed a kangaroo, pet a wombat, throw a ice cream cone at an emu, hug another kangaroo, watch a dingo eat a baby, and most importantly pet a koala. The worlds softest animal, sorry snickers but this thing was like 10 puppies in 1. I was tempted to bring some ucalyptus back home w. me in hopes of attracting a koala to move to the states. Customs stopped me on the way back to Melbourne tho-next time ill ship it. After the amazingness of the koalas we headed up to the blue mountains and saw the Australian less than equivalent of the Grand Canyon. It was also very cool, very scenic, and as always took lots and lots of pictures. While up at the mountains I was walkin by as some kid and his brother were wearing under armor Terps hoodies and I shouted out “Go Terps!” They turned with enthusiasm and we had a nice almost gay moment where we realized 13,000 miles away, we were still terps [g’d I fucking love college park!]. His dad took a picture, we talked for 5 minutes and left with a satified feeling as to almost think, wow, I love this place. It was a cool feeling, and after that we headed back to the bus and had peaceful 2 hr ride back to Sydney. It was another great day and thinking abt it makes me wish I was back there.

Monday was another nice day. We took the ferry across the Sydney harbor and ended up in Manley beach. It was about 65 degrees in the height of winter, and the bakinis were out, the surfers were goin, and the place was amazing. It was beyond scenic and a great day to hit the shops and walk along the beach. We came back after abt 5 hrs there, had some dinner, watch Dan In Real life on pay-per-view and called it a night. Tuesday was another unforgettable day. We got up at 8am, had some breakfast, got a nice coffee (flat whites are amazing here), and then climbed 1,437 steps up and down to the top of the Sydney Harbor Bridge. With 676573243 tons of steel used to make, and $200 to climb, the levines were across and on top of the world at the same time. We came back down, shaking and all, and headed back to get washed up before the 39 Steps, an original Alfred Hitchcock play, however this one was a comedy. At the end of the day it was still a play, and I was never regarded as a thespian aside from my short stint in Robert Frost Middle School’s production of “Rock Around The Clock.” However it was in the Opera House so that was pretty sick. And then push came to shove, and the parents headed back for home Wednesday Morning, and I went back to Melborune.

And that’s where I am now. Sitting in front of my computer, uploaded a few pics from 2 weeks ago (and I will upload the ones from this past week when I get back next week) , and I just got back from Sydney yesterday. Its been a month guys. I don’t know what that sounds like to you, but to me its sounds like an eternity, and also a flash. I’m about ¼ way through my time here and I love it. I absolutely love it. I haven’t been as “mitch” as I am at home, I am not going to the bar every night, not going after the random hookups with such enthusiasm, no 30 packs in the fridge (well they exactly exist), but what I am doing is soaking it all in. It’s a growing process, its not what I thought it was going to be, nor could I have ever guessed this is how it was going to turn out, but I’m flying to Brisbane and the Gold Coast in a little under an hour, I’m going bungee jumping in 2 days, maybe sky diving in 3, scuba diving in 2 weeks, back to Sydney in 3 week, and all the while loving life. I miss college park in a way I never imagined, but more than College Park, I miss the comfort of having all my friends around me and the bars where everyone knows your name. Here there is one bar that every Tuesday we head out to, the Turf club and bar, and everyone from my apt complex heads there; there are parties once a week, goon pong every weekend, and lots of fun, but its not the same lifestyle as back home. And what I am beginning to realize is that’s all right. That is in fact why I am here, to put myself outside of my comfort zone. I won’t be in College all my life, but while I am better get the most out of it. I just bought a gift for my friend and it’s a piece of canvas with the saying “the most important thing is today,” and that’s exactly what it should be. In the words of my late brother and truly an amazing person, “It’s a great day to be alive, and don’t you ever forget it” –KMF…..and I never will.

Have a great weekend guys, thanks for reading.

It puts the joey in the pouch

What What in the Outback?

Hows it going guys. I am back to my regular weekly routine of blogging and it feels good. Before I begin my recounts of this past week I hope everyone is doing well back home. I am having an amazing time down here, but this place would be even better if MoCo + CP joined the team down under.

To play off of my emotional appeal, as the "summer" rapidly nears its end, I can only think back to this time last year when I was living at home, eagerly awaiting August 15th, the day I could move into Commons 1302. It was an amazing day and the first few weeks were some of the best I can remember. The past 3 weeks here have gone by fast and slow. It feels like I got here yesterday, but at the same time I feel like ive been here for months. It is a bizarre feeling, and one which people who have been abroad I'm sure appreciate. For those that have not, know that I love it here and it is an experience unlike any other, but the times I had in CP are unbeatable.

Now back to my escapades. No quotes this time, but to refresh everyones memory, the pizza here is outrageous, and while I am used to potomac pizza and ratsies for my normal fix, MoJo's pizza and Pepperonis has an edge that soon will not be equated to that of famous Rays or Cicero's in NY.

So I left off last Week telling you about my job as a bartender, my travels down to St. Kilda, and times during re-o week where I met all the other Melbourne exchange students. This week has definitely been different. Thats probably the biggest thing to comment on in regards to being abroad, everything is different. I am sure that it will level off in the next week or so, but for now every week brings new events and stories, and I cannot wait until I start traveling so I will have even better pictures, and much better stories.

• SUNDAY- So this past week we started off by going to my friend Joy's lacrosse game. We chilled there all Sunday morning and met a bunch of those players. It was pouring for 1/2 the game, but after a while it opened up and watching them loose 21-2 was actually pretty amusing. After the game and meeting all the girls we headed back, chilled for a nice long while, warmed up and went over the the Crown Casino. This place is set just south of the Yara river, which is abt a mile long and feeds into Port Phillip Bay- fucking beautiful during the day, and even more amazing at night w/ all the city lights reflecting on it. The Casino is in basically the '5th ave' of Melbourne. It has about 20 shops in and around it, ranging from Versacce to whatever the fuck is an expensive store. But its a really sick place. It is also right next door to the world's tallest apartment building and the southern hemisphere's highest observation deck. I will post those pictures later- no worries. Anyways Crown is shit compared to Vegas, but when you compare it to basically one casino in vegas, it stacks up pretty well. Shitty tables and way too high stakes of roulet and blackjack, but if I want to loose another $200, I know where to go.......After Crown and loosing some cash, I thought I'd clear my head by going to the mind blowingly sweet mall in downtown Melbourne. It has 4+ bars, a pool hall, a lot of crazy restaurants, and an amazing movie theater. BTW if you think movie tickets are expensive in the states, $14 for a student ticket is what I'm paying here, and after the 2 pitchers and 2 games pool to kill time before the movie, the Casino was the least of my financial worries. But while the movie sucked (X files, don't bother w/ that garbage), the day was full of explorations and pleanty of good times.

• MONDAY- The next day, Monday, was back to class. I went to bed around 3 (im assuming sicne thats my generic bed time, so anytime before 1pm back home is fair game for some late night/early afternoon skyping) and got up around 1230 for my 130 class. Went there and then decided what the fuck am I doing in class. I left right after class ended, hauled ass back to my place, ran into a friend and was like wow, class in a foreign country just doesn't seem worth it, lets go drink. So we started drinking goon abt 2 hrs later, chalked up some wins on my goon pong leaderboard, and then hit the town. Sad as it is tho, Melbourne is not NY, not even is it DC. All but a few bars were open, and those few bars that were open were filled to the brim with the excretions of asia. It seemed like the opening ceremonies of Bejing only w/ less athletic people, and more weed. Either way we stayed buzzed, walked around town for abt 2 hrs, went to a few random bars, and FINALLY had our first run in w/ the VICPD- the Victoria Police Department! It was great, my friends had to take a leak, so instead of going to 1 of the 300 public restrooms (aka toilets)--they peed behind a dumpster and I took the pictures, sound gay? Well it was--anyways the cops say them peeing and pulled into this dark alley, threatened them w/ $220 fines, I said my cousin is a lawyer, do I need to call him, he said shut the fuck up u spoiled American (not really but it adds a lot to the story) and then he drove on his merry way.

• TUESDAY- The next night, Tuesday, we went to the Melbourne International film festival. That my friends, was awesome. Oddly enough we say an American made movie, the Wackness. It was phenominal. It was about this guy, aka Josh from Drake and Josh- the weird disney show w/ the fat kid from max keebles big move, only now hes not fat, hes an emo pot dealer. So hes a virgin trying to get laid and get over his depression, so he sells weed to the therapist in exchange for therapy. It also stars the hot friend from Juno as the love interest. Honestly, a great movie, and at this festival it was even better. Apparently the festival is 3rd below Cannes and Sundance, but it was a great time. Samuel L Jackson was the guest of honor last yr, and I think Nicholas Cage was this year. Anyways after the movie we stopped by this cigar shop and I wanted to buy a zippo that has a koala holding an Australian Flag on it.... the guy said it was $80, im like I wont spend more than 40- he said, ok only cuz Im jewish and I know what its like, ill give it to you for $70.....$60....$50.... 5 minutes later i paid $40. Its sweet, and hopefully we can use it before August 6th.... Pineapple Express!
  

• WEDNESDAY- The next day, Wednesday- just chill and goin to classes but Thursday is where shit turned crazy.
  

• THURSDAY- Guess who arrives in the Melbourne International Airport?? Shelley and Marty Levine! Thats right the parents make it to town and it was great to have them. I leave class as soon as its over and head over to their hotel in downtown. We hug, say out hellos, and its just like i left yesterday. I took them downtown, showed them the city took them to some good spots, and then jumped on a tram into the "Jewish district." My dad, the super loving jew that he is talked to my Rabbi before he got there and scoped out some good bakeries with some actual Challah! And since I haven't had a bagel since bagel place, I figured a tram ride through the city would be worth it. We walked around, asked for some directions, and found ourselves at this crazy ortho part of town and felt like Tel Aviv all over. We stopped in this once place for some food and just as soon as I sit down, Marty is workin his magic and talkin to the girl at the counter. Turns out she just moved here from Jerusalem and my dad pointed over my direction with my back facing him and said "you see my son over there? Well he is after a nice jewish girl to go out with on saturday nights and hang out." Much to my dismay, it was not my 64 year old father that was left to hitting on girls for me, apparently my game has really gone down hill since I got here. Regardless I wave, say hello, and then get the fuck outa dodge. We head back, grab some chinese food in china town, and then I head back, pick up a box of good, and set up pong.

• THURSDAY NIGHT- The night was another story. I have a shit load of pictures that I will be sure to upload ASAP, however, I do not know all that much of what happened so it will be the pictures doing the story. It was the Melbourne University Pub Crawl- and since RMIT is basically the equivalent to the Towson of MD (thats right i said it)- Uni Melbourne is awesome and hosts pub crawls for its students. Anyways from what I remember, I FINALLY met Veronica and Brianne (btw happy 19th birthday Veronica), the 2 girls from Jersey that live on the 1st floor that will be joining us in our adventure to Brisbane in only a few short weeks. We played a game of pong, went downstairs, and went o the first bar. But before we left I took 4 shots in 5 minutes, and this is where the night blurs together. We go to 2 bars, the first one is 1/2 outdoors and 1/2 indoors. $12 pitchers so of course I get my own to chug, and share a sparing amount w/ the cute Uni Melbourne girls. The more I write about it, the happier I get because this was a crazy night. Then a few girls leave, me and some other kids decide to stay to finish our drinks. Then when the drinks hit the bottom, we head over to the other bar. This bar was huge, 2 levels, a fucking underground rainforrest under glass and made w/ legos or some crazy shit, and $3.50 rails- which in this town is amazing! I bought a round for the 6 people around me, headed upstairs set up there for a while and yadda yadda yadda, I have about 50 pictures, 5 new numbers (da numbers sabbagh!) and no recollection of the rest of the night.
  

• FRIDAY- supposed to meet my parents at 10, THAT didn't happen. Saw them around 1130 for a late breakfast. We walked around town, took them to Flinders lane, which is basically like 40 shops in 2 blocks. People eating outdoors, walking and talking, and the hustle and bustle of new york, only condensed into 2 blocks and filled to the brim w/ people and action. Then we went to St. Kilda beach. It wasn't the best weather so instead of going to the pier, we just walked around, had another amzing burger, got some sweet chocolate covered churros, and did some shopping. My mom loved it, my dad had a good time, and I got a free lunch and spent time w/ my parents, so it was a win-win-win. I then had dinner w/ them and also my cousin June has friends that live in Melbourne so she gave me their name and # and they took us all around local places in the city. Got a great perspective of life in the city and was a very nice relaxed time w/ the family. I decided to crash at their place friday night sicne we were leaving at 8am the next morning for 'the great ocean road tour.'

• SATURDAY- with the parents still in town and eager to see all the excitement, we went on a 13 hr bus tour of the entire southern coast of Australia. It was a very very very relaxing day, and was also my dad's birthday. So happy birthday to marty and it was an excellent way to spend the day. We say some crazy sights. It is basically like the Pacific Coast Highway (aka Big Sur) in between LA and Fransisco, but 10x cooler. There are random cliffs that just free stand in the middle of the ocean right off the coast and I will be sure to upload some breathtaking picutres. We got back around 10pm and then I headed back and played some goon pong, got way to drunk and passed out after watching entourage at around 4am.

• SUNDAY- after getting 6 hrs of sleep last night, me and the folks go the victorian market which is the largest outdoor market in the southern hemisphere, and equated to the turkish bizarre, or if uve ever been to southern florida, 10 flea markets in one place. Then we went for brunch in richmond w/ my cousins friend. The what I mentioned about 3 pages ago, with the largest apt building in the world- my parents and I came back form richmond and took the elevator up to the 88th floor and had a sick view of the city. Took about an hr break up there, then wento to the crown casino, played roulet for 5 minutes, lost $20 and headed over to dinner. My friends Thomas, Joy, Brendan, Brianne and Veronica all joined in for a great time on Lygon street- little italy. We got 2 free bottles of wine, some great chicken parm, and got a chance to show my parents that I actually have a few friends- they think im a loner, its sad. Then thomas, joy and I came back to the hotel for a nice dip in the hotel hot tub, chilled for an hr and took it easy that night.
  

This is one long mamma jamma blog, but if you actually did read it- congrats.

Summation:
Sunday- Lax + Mall
Monday- Class + drinking + police
Tuesday- Film Festival
Wednesday- chill
Thursday- parents + jews + blackout
Friday - st. kilda + chineese
Saturday - Great ocean road + goon pong
Sunday - market + richmond + dinner w/ friends/parents + hot tub
WEEK- AMAZING

stay posted guys

Cheers,
Mitch