Did you know that many Aussies refer to Australia as the Land of Oz? Perhaps this continent has a little magic of its own, but the main reason it’s referred to as Oz is because of all the strange and mysterious little flora and fauna that call this place home. Seeing that this is such an isolated continent with incredibly harsh and varied environments, the plants and animals here have acquired some very strange characteristics over the years: hibernating fish, trees that produce seeds that need fire to open the shell, legless lizards, blob fish, duck-billed web-footed things, the list goes on and on.
Speaking of duckbills….guess what, I saw a platypus! It wasn’t exactly in the wild though. I hear they’re very shy creatures, so the chances of me actually seeing one hanging around the local waterhole are slim to none. Sad day. But I still saw one! Here’s how…
Last weekend, a few of my friends and I took a ferry out to the Taronga Zoo (I guess that’s where Steve Irwin worked…Crikey!). Besides a platypus, we saw quite a few animals native to Australia – kangaroos, wallabies, emu, echidnas, wombats, and other strange creatures I can’t recall the names to at the moment. Being that this was a zoo, there were plenty of the regular zoo residents as well– the elephants, big cats, bears, giraffe, mountain goats, and sheep and chickens for the petting zoo. In my opinion, the Omaha Zoo is better, but this was still pretty awesome.
Random story…while we were at the zoo, we happened to see a guy writing stuff in the sky with an airplane. I’ve never actually seen that before, and it was AWESOME. Picture the skill and patience that would take…my favorite word he wrote was ‘imagine’.
I’ve come to the conclusion that there are absolutely no car washes here (at least, I have yet to see one). Since Australia is such an arid place, water is a very valuable resource. They are EXTREMELY conscious of their water usage, putting water restrictions on almost everything - no watering lawns (their lawns are SUPER tiny to begin with anyway), no washing cars in your driveway (I love to wash my car!!), very little watering for the gardens, their toilets have half flush and full flush options, showers are recommended to have a low pressure flow, a lot of people don’t even rinse the soap off their dishes after washing them (they just let them dry on a rack with the soap dripping from them!). There’s a politician in the independent party who thinks Australia ought to turn all their rivers inward so that all the water flows into the extremely dry places….operation make Australia green I guess! Crazy stuff, eh?
The rainfall is very difficult to predict here – rains may come or they may not, there’s no real way to know when or how much. They have lakes here and there that are dry for a long time and then all of a sudden fill up with water out of the blue. What’s even more interesting is that they’re filled with fish! The fish lie dormant in the land until the water supply returns. Once the water returns, they wake up from their little nap and swim around for a bit before going back into hibernation when the lake decides to dry up again…
Fun fact for the day:
My spring break is the same week IWU begins classes. It’s so crazy to think that I’ve already had 6 full weeks of class while my home campus is just starting their semester. What’s even crazier is I only have 7 more weeks of actual class left…..that’s kind of scary to think about. In reality, I actually have 10 more weeks left in Australia if you factor in all the break weeks we get. Still, time is flying by. Before I know it, I’ll be boarding a plane back home.
Just a heads up, I won’t be posting any blogs for the next 2 weeks. Since it’s spring break this week (Sept. 4-12), a few of us are taking a crazy 7 day trip around Australia. First stop is Cairns (pronounced ‘cans’) where we’ll be snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef and exploring the Daintree Rainforest for 2 days. Then we’ll head to the southern tip to run around Melbourne (pronounced ‘melbun’) for 2 days. Melbourne is another big city in Australia, known especially for its shopping and restaurants. After that we’ll be going even further south to the island/state of Tasmania where we’ll spend our last 3 days. I guess this area is gorgeous, filled with amazing national parks (they’re also known for their casinos, but I’ll think I’ll pass on that part). If you think that sounds like a full week, the day after we get back from our little spring break excursion we head for the Outback. It’ll take us two days to get out to the ranch where we’ll be staying, we’ll spend two nights out there, and then make the 2 day trek back to Sydney. Then, of course, classes resume on the 20th of September. So I guess this is farewell for now! I’ll be sure to bring back some crazy stories and photos for ya’ll….In the meantime, here are some common Aussie words/phrases for you to try out for the next couple of weeks:
Maccers (pronounced mac-kahs) – Aussie for McDonalds
Salvos – Salvation Army
Servo – Service/Petrol Station
Uni – university/college
Jumper (pronounced jumpah) – sweatshirt
Rubbish – trash
Toilet – the bathroom/restroom
Bathroom – shower room
Heaps – lots and lots
“I reckon…” – I believe / I think…
“No worries” – commonly used in the place of ‘your welcome’
“Good on you!” – well done
“How are you going?” – how are you/how’s it going?
“How are you finding it?” – do you like it?
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