Melbourne Welcome

At the University of Melbourne, a group of Australian students put on the "Melbourne Welcome" to welcome all of the study abroad/exchange students to the college. We arrived on the morning of Friday the 11th of February and checked in to receive the rooms we would be staying in for the next 5 days. We were staying in Queens College, which is one of the numerous colleges at the campus. Queens College has dorm rooms and a "cafeteria," where everyone eats meals together. Several times a week, they have formal dinners, where the students dress up in cocktail dresses and black-tie apparel and wear robes (think Harry Potter) and there's a high table. The requirements for attire and how many formal dinners there are depends on which college you're in.

Friday, 11th February
We were put into groups with an Australian student host; my host's name was Kathleen and she was originally from Canberra, Australia. We jumped on a tram after introductions and headed into the center of Melbourne for a city tour in the form of a scavenger hunt (pictures to come!) The scavenger hunt included things such as: take a picture of everywhere that sells a metcard (ticket for the tram), find the most expensive piece of women's lingerie in a certain store ($990!), take a picture with a policeman, take a picture with a Big W (the Australian's walmart) employee, if you buy the judges a Krispy Kreme donut you get 50 points, find the Shanghai dumpling restaurant, and more. It was quite fun!

Then we proceeded to document each task with a picture (of course I volunteered!) and present it to the student judges once back on campus. After dinner, which consisted of meat pies (think personal chicken pot pie), which was very good, we gathered in the JCR (Junior Common Room) to play trivia! Questions ranged from name the song/artist, to details about why Canberra is Australia's capital. After trivia, a group of us went to a bar called Pugg's, where there was a room rented out for us to socialize and dance!

Saturday, 12th February
Woke up to I come from a land down under (check out the link to hear it!) which was quite amusing I have to say, but it was stuck in my head for the rest of the day haha. We ate a quick brekkie (Aussie word for breakfast), got into 3 buses, and headed off to Ocean Grove on the Great Ocean Road to surf for the day! We went in 3 shifts because there were so many people. I was in the first group, which was nice cause we got the dry wet suits! It's really fun, I think the last lesson helped cause my friend and I were pros compared to everyone else! (Though we were only surfing like 1 foot waves haha). I think they have a surfing club at the uni, which I might try to join. They take surfing trips on the weekends, which would be really fun!

After surfing, we just hung out on the beach. I read my book and forgot to put sunscreen on my legs (I was wearing a hat, sunglasses, and a long-sleeved shirt!) and got the worst sunburn I've ever had. Seriously. It's disgusting. Note to self: the hole in the ozone layer is right above Australia = PUT ON SUNSCREEN EVERYDAY NO MATTER WHAT!!! (and it better be at least 30 SPF!)

Anyways, after surfing, we hung out on the beach and I read (and got burned) and we got fish and chips for lunch! The fish pieces were HUGE. And amazing!

After lunch and the beach and after everyone had a chance to go surfing, we trekked back to Melbourne Uni and had dinner. After dinner, I walked back to RMIT Village in order to use the internet (the uni had internet but we couldn't get on facebook or on gmail to talk to anyone).

Sunday, 13th February
In the morning, we were shown around the University of Melbourne by our hosts. Then we walked to Queen Victoria's Market, which is a HUGE farmer's market. It has EVERYTHING. Fresh meat, seafood, vegetables, fruit, wine, clothes, shoes, sunglasses, and more. It's a really great way to get healthy but cheap food, and has great souvenirs! (Let me know if anyone wants anything from Australia!)

We then had lunch and headed to the Melbourne Zoo! It was really cool! We were able to see platypuses (platypi?), koalas, kangaroos, bongos, wild dogs, baboons, and more! The kangaroo exhibit was really cool, you go in this enclosure that you don't think you're allowed in, and you're right in there with the kangaroos! Some were jumping right up to people and people were taking pictures with them haha. There were also emus in there; they are quite strange looking, I must say. Like a giant feathery pillow with two skinny legs and a skinny neck. The platypus was really cool. When you go in, you have to be really quiet and turn your flash on your camera off cause they're nocturnal. And they won't come out of hiding unless it's quiet and dark. The first time we went to see them, they didn't come out cause people were being too loud. We tried a second time though, and they were SO. COOL. 

After the zoo, we made our way back to the uni and had dinner. Then a bunch of us took the tram to the St. Kilda Festival, where they had closed down the roads and had a giant stage with music. It was packed. We kept trying to get into a restaurant or bar to get some drinks but we couldn't because there was either an expensive cover ($25 at one place!) or the places were full. Finally we were able to get into a Spanish bar because my friend Juan knows the owner, so that was fun!

Monday, 14th February - Happy Valentine's Day!
On Monday we had a couple of options to choose from. There was a tour of the cricket fields, a tour of the Koories (Aborigines) museum, a tour of the Melbourne museum, or you could do anything you needed to do in Melbourne, like get a phone or find an apartment. I wanted to go to the cricket ground, but that had filled up, so we ended up going to the Melbourne museum. It was cool, it had a section on the history of Melbourne and an Aborigines section as well.

After the museum, we went to the Botanical Gardens for a picnic lunch and then went to the Eureka Skydeck. The Skydeck is an incredibly tall building, about 300 meters tall, and you go up and get to see a panoramic view of the city of Melbourne. The day was beautiful, so you could see forever! The Skydeck also has this glass cube you can pay to go in (I didn't do it, but it looked cool!) and it goes out of the building and suspends you over the city. They run an electric current through it so when you initially go out over the city, the glass is opaque and you can't see through it. Then they quickly turn off the current, so the glass turns clear and all of a sudden you are standing over 300 meters of air and the city of Melbourne!

After the Skydeck, our hosts took us on a tour of the laneways, or small side streets where they have a lot of cafes and restaurants and bars. Then I stopped at the Big W to get a pair of leggings to wear for the formal dinner (didn't want to make people look at my nasty sunburn) and took the tram back to the uni.

We then had our formal dinner. Ladies had to wear cocktail attire, with heels or nice sandals or flats. Guys had to wear black tie attire, button up shirts with a tie preferably, with slacks and nice shoes. We went into the dining hall and sat at tables with our host groups (think Harry Potter, but with smaller tables). They had put table cloths on the table with candles and nice place settings. And each table came equipped with a free bottle of white wine and a free bottle of red wine!

They rang a bell and everyone had to stand up for the procession of the people at the high table. They were the speaker and the master of Queens College and they were wearing their robes. The master spoke to us and so did the speaker. Then they did grace in Latin and then translated it into English for us to understand. After that, we were able to open our bottles of wine and dig into the delicious food they had prepared for us. I had pork, while others had salmon and steak. Dessert was pavlova, an Australian dessert made with eggs and sugar, like meringue.

After the formal dinner, we all continued to socialize in the tower lecture room of the dorm, till we left for the club at 9:15 pm. The club was quite fun! They had a nice dance floor and couches for us to socialize and relax on. All in all, Melbourne welcome was quite a fun time!