"The world is a book..."

"...and those who do not travel read only one page."
-St. Augustine

Missed my backyard.

I'm back home now and I've just been making my last additions to the blog.  It's amazing looking back over all the experiences I had abroad, not just of seeing new places and meeting new people, but the internal ones. Australia has made me grow, has pushed me to my limits, forced me to find comfort in new friends, and helped me see the strength and independence I possess. It has shown me about my relationships with people back home, especially with people constantly held close at heart regardless the physical distance between us. It has changed my perspective of life and what one should strive for.

"One's destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things."
-Henry Miller

As much as I'll miss my time abroad, returning home was such a welcomed experience. I came home with a new appreciation of hugging my sisters, being greeted at the door by my dogs, sleeping in my bed, relaxing in the hot tub with my family, and having a home-cooked meal with people I love. Although I felt a great familiarity with all these things, I also felt as if I was experiencing them for the first time when I came back. It made me realize how lucky I was to have these people in my life. I guess if I had to sum it up I'd tell people to go see the world, but also see the beauty of where they are right this moment...and never pass up the opportunity to hug a loved one.

New Zealand

Finals! Packing! Goodbyes! After finishing my finals last Wednesday, I started packing up for New Zealand. Initially I wanted to go to Queenstown and Kristina was going to go with me, but StudentUniverse could only get flights to Christchurch and Kristina couldn’t get her flight switched. So there I was by myself booked to go to Christchurch. I was super close to just switching to an earlier flight back home. Everybody kept talking about how dead Christchurch was because of the earthquakes and I didn’t really have any idea what I’d do while I was there. The flight was also a forced overnight so I’d be spending the night in the Auckland airport by myself. Not super appetizing. I had it in my mind that I would switch my flight back to the US but for some reason I just couldn’t do it. Thank goodness I didn’t! Christchurch has been amazing. Saturday after checking into the Around the World Backpackers hostel I spent the day wandering around Christchurch. It’s such a strange vibe going on here. I’ve never felt anything like it. Actually seeing the aftermath of a city hit by a natural disaster has given me a new perspective. I walked around the city centre. Many of the beautiful gothic buildings were destroyed by the September earthquake. Next to the destroyed buildings they’ve set up a city centre using large storage boxes for stores! It actually looks really modern and cool not to mention it’s a creative way of bouncing back after the earthquake. Right next to the shops there’s a walk along where you can look at all the damage that happened to the heart of the city and watch them rebuilding it. I could here snippets of people’s conversations, sometimes recalling memories and pointing to the areas where beloved buildings used to stand. Other conversations were about what the plans were to rebuild. The juxtaposition of the new shops with the old destroyed buildings was really strange to experience, but overall there was a sense of connectedness. There were carolers and street shows in the shopping centre and everybody was really kind to each other. After exploring the town centre I walked over to Hagley Park. I walked along a path by the stream. There were cotton fibers from the trees swirling all around. It almost looked like it was snowing! The path took me to the botanic gardens. I wandered through all of them until I got to the rose garden. I sat and read there for a while and ended up taking a bit of a catnap. As I was about to leave I ended up taking to a lady from Christchurch for about an hour. She talked about the earthquakes and what it’s like to have that happen to your home. I could tell how deeply sad she was, but also how connected she was to the city. It really made me think about what actually connects us to a place and whether it’s the buildings or if it goes deeper than that. After I had dinner back at the hostel I went to a hostel down the street I had met some friends at and we hung out and drank beers. We had people from France, Germany, Italy, Canada, and the US all at the same table. I then headed back to my hostel. It was pretty late, but I ended up playing Clue (or Cluedo as it’s called here) with some friends.

On Sunday I went to Hanmer Springs. It was a couple hours by shuttle. The scenery on the way up was amazing! There were large luscious green mountains and sheep everywhere! I spent the first part of my time at Hanmer exploring the shops. It’s a little alpine town and reminded me a lot of Sonora. I got some of the best fish and chips of my life for lunch and then went to the hot springs. I spent most of my time in the natural pools. The water has sulfur in it so it didn’t smell the best but the water supposedly has healing properties. The hot springs was just what I needed to melt off the any residual stress from finals and traveling. I slept on the shuttle ride back and then had a relaxing evening at the hostel.

On Monday I took a tour to the small coastal town of Akaroa. It’s a cute little French town and the perfect place to be for my last day in New Zealand. I took a tour through the harbor and got to see the world’s smallest and rarest dolphins, the Hector dolphin. There was a dog on board named Murphy who could sense the dolphins before the humans. He would suddenly run to the edge of the boat and all the people would follow and there would be dolphins! When I was trying to describe the trip to my family they teased me that I was making it all up with “Murph Murph the Dolphin Dog” (that’s actually a kid’s book written about it), and it does sound kind of ridiculous. It was the perfect way to spend my last day in New Zealand.

Sydney

In front of the Opera House

I got back from Townsville Monday night, went to my final week of classes, and on Friday I flew to Sydney. My flight got in a few minutes after my parents so they met me at my luggage pick up. We stayed with my parents close friends named Rob and Romana from back in Canada who have been living in Sydney. They’re wonderfully people and I’m so thankful for my parents friendship with them! They live in a great apartment with a beautiful balcony overlooking Sydney harbour.

Breakfast on the balcony

On Saturday the five of us (Rob and Romana, my parents, and me) went to Bondi beach. It was so pretty! My dad and Rob ended up swimming. They had a lot of fun and ended up spending just about an hour in the water! On Sunday my dad and Rob did the Harbour Bridge climb. Meanwhile Romana, my mom, and I walked around the Rocks. Many of the buildings were the original ones and it was such a beautiful area! On Monday morning we packed up to leave and then went for a walk. Romana gave me all these oil essences that they had gotten on a trip to Egypt, they’re just beautiful and all the different ones are supposed to correspond to different schakras and help to keep you in balance. The whole weekend was just wonderful and my favorite part about it was the great company! It was so nice to be with my parents again and Rob and Romana are fantastic. They’re some of the most genuine people I’ve ever met and they have an energy that’s just wonderful to be around.

Going Troppo

Beautiful Aussie Sunset

I just spent the past four days living on a boat! My mom and dad came to Australia (how sweet of them to travel halfway across the world just to see me…). They drove up to Gold Coast on Tuesday night. Wednesday my dad went to my Buddhism tutorial with me, he really enjoyed it and he and my mom ended up going to the monastery for the day. That night we went out to dinner at a place called Helena and had the best Greek food I’ve had in my life! It was amazing having delicious food again after living off mainly cafeteria food for months… We had our flight early the next morning up to Townsville. When we first arrived it was pouring rain so we were kinda concerned, but the universe was just getting it out of its system for us because we had amazing weather the rest of the time we were there! My parents and I took a taxi straight from the airport to the dive shop where we met up with Rob. We got our dive equipment and headed to the yacht club. The boat we were using, that we got through one of Rob’s friends, was called Iseulta. I had never been on a sail boat before so I had no idea what it was all about. I was surprised to see how spacious the downstairs area was. My mom and dad slept in the front room, Rob slept in the back room, and I slept on the couch in the middle area.

Welcome to my bedroom (notice Mom sleeping in the back)

We motored out to sea and as soon as we got out far enough the guys put up the sails and turned off the motor. It’s amazing what a difference it makes! Turning off the motor and going off of wind power makes things so peaceful. We stopped for some snorkeling after awhile. At the dive shop they told us about these jellyfish called “stingers” and said we have to wear either full body wet suits or exposure suits to avoid being stung by them because it can be deadly. So we were all initially a little nervous about them, but as the days went on we figured out that it was kinda silly. I stopped wearing my full wet suit and started wearing my mom’s shortie wetsuit.  My dad talked to a local on one of the islands and he said you didn’t need to be worried about the stingers…and they could sting through the exposure suits anyway!

I think one of the stingers got Dad....

Our first night we had burgers for dinner that we cooked on the BBQ. It definitely gave new meaning to cheeseburger in paradise! It was kind of a windy night which was nice because a slight breeze cooled things off nicely in the lower part of the boat, but it was also a bit rocky. It rained a bit too and it was amazing feeling the tropical rain coming through the cracked windows. The next day we sailed up to Pioneer Bay.

Captain Rob

It was such a calm and peaceful night and I slept great. The next morning we went on a dive. I hadn’t been diving for years and I was so nice to get back in the water! The coral was so vibrant and amazing. I saw clams that were as big as I was and so many cool fish! The coral was really neat too. I’ve never seen so much coral so shallow. That night we had steak for dinner. The next day we did some diving in the same cool area we had found the day before. When we weren’t diving we’d relax on the boat and just chill and drink beer.

Pure Blonde Aussie Beer

On Sunday morning my dad, Rob, and I climbed to the top of the island. We went at like eight and it was already super hot! It was cool to look back at the ocean from the top and see our boat.

At the top of the island

One of those boats is Iseulta

Then we got ready to start sailing back. We did some snorkeling in some other spots, but didn’t find anything as good as the spot we found before. After sailing until evening we found a spot to stop for the night. We woke up early the next day and sailed back to the yacht club. It was so weird stepping on solid ground! For days after the trip I felt like I was constantly swaying. I flew back to Gold Coast and my parents flew up to Cairns for their live-a-board course.