Hey everyone!
Today I looked at the calendar and realized that I've been here for exactly two weeks. It's so crazy, because I feel like it's been so much longer! In some respects, I am so comfortable here and feel like I have my routines and that I've been here forever. However, starting classes has made me realize all the ways I am new and all the things that are still foreign to me.
Classes started Monday. After being here for over a week and doing nothing but going to the beach, hanging by the pool, and doing whatever ridiculous events they had planned for us, I'm still struggling to get into school mode. My schedule here consists of Macroeconomics, Intro to Statistics, Indigenous Studies, and Australian Politics in a Global Context. For most of my classes, I have one lecture and one tutorial a week, which seems like so little compared to my schedule back home. However, for two of my classes I have 3 time commitments a week. This week we didn't have any tutorials, so my load was a little lighter. (In fact, I had the day off today because there were no tutorials!) It's very strange being in huge lecture halls with hundreds of other students after getting used to Beloit, where the maximum class size I've ever had was 30 people. But I don't mind the big lectures. The only problem is that it gets hot with so many bodies in the room and sometimes it's hard to stay awake when it's warm and I'm tired lol.
I managed to find all my classrooms and everything pretty easily. The campus is bigger than Beloit, but not as big as I was expecting. I only had trouble finding one class. It's a little hard to adjust to a new place, like going to the library and not knowing where the computers are or how to use the system or that some of the computers are reserved for certain courses of study. I have been pretty happy since I've been here, but Wednesday I was tired and feeling a bit lost and that's when I started to miss the comforts of home and the comfort of being well acquainted with my surroundings.
This week was kind of fun because all the student groups on campus set up tents around the courtyard and you can walk through and sign up for all kinds of activities. I didn't peruse them very thoroughly, because everyone tries to hand you a bunch of stuff if you linger too long, but I did stop and sign up at the career services tent, so hopefully I'll be able to get a campus job. On Tuesday I went down to the Macquarie Shopping Center (aka the Mac Center) and spent a couple hours applying at practically every store. I was so exhausted by the end, but hopefully my hard work will pay off. At this point, I don't have very high hopes though, because some of my friends that got here a couple weeks before me applied at a lot of places and haven't gotten any job offers or interviews. Some of the stores told me that they did most of their hiring in December, at the start of summer. But, you never know. I might get lucky and get a campus job or something. I hope so, because living here is very expensive. I haven't even done a bunch of fun things yet and I've already spent a chunk of money just for every day supplies. But I'm sick of complaining about the prices. It is what it is and I'm only here for 5 months!
Last Sunday was a very exciting day for me, because my friend Bethany told me that there is a Hillsong Church extension service at the Mac Center (held in the movie theatre lol). We went in the morning and the service was great!! Then, making things even better, our friend Gabe told us that there is a bus that runs for free from the Mac Center to the main Hillsong Church campus on Sunday nights! We went to the 6 pm service at the big Hillsong Church, which was even more amazing! I'm so excited to go there every weekend. I think there's a Hillsong campus group, so I'll have to investigate that. It felt so wonderful to go to church after a couple weeks of not being able to go. We've even got a decently large group of people from DLC to go, and it just keeps growing. Bethany, Gabe, Trevor, Jacob, Kyle and I went this past weekend. A couple more might come with us this Sunday.
Bethany and I have begun doing a morning bible study together every day. It's such an awesome way to start our mornings, and it really helps us keep our focus on God. Here in Australia, it can be very easy to get sucked into the party lifestyle, but we've be diligently working to stay true to who we are in Christ and be good witnesses to all those that live around us. We're going through Proverbs, which is pretty fitting because we need all the wisdom and discernment we can get while we adjust to this different lifestyle.
It's interesting being here and being able to drink legally. Australians go out to the bars a lot, even on weeknights. Wednesdays and Thursdays are big nights to go to the Ranch and Ubar (the campus bar), so we went out with some people from DLC both nights this week. I really enjoy being able to just have a drink or two and be social without getting drunk or anything. It's actually been a pretty good way to witness because people will ask me, "Are you still on your first drink?" and I'll tell them "Yes, I'm not going to get drunk." :) And the dancing here is fun too. Australians don't grind like Americans do--they don't really touch at all when they dance, so I've had fun dancing with my friends in a pretty wholesome, fun way. Like my friend Kyle said, "I like that Australians leave room for Jesus!" lol.
Overall, I'm having a great time. Hopefully I'll get used to this academic system quickly and be able to perform well :)
