I was lucky enough to chaperone another skorkeling trip out to Julian Rocks in the bay on Wednesday. One of my students took some very nice underwater photos and she was nice enough to share them with me! Unfortunately this time the water wasn't as visible as last time, there was quick a lot of suspended materials in the water. I did get so see some great stuff like a some sea turtles, more leopard sharks, tons of fish and as we got out of the water we saw a 6 foot manta ray! Despite the less than ideal water conditions it was an absolutely beautiful day and I felt very alive. The sun made the Bay and the distant mountains seem surreal and it was really something else, I don't think the pictures do this place any justice!
Tuesday was an eventful day at Byron Bay High School. Steve showed me some exciting local animals. The first was the bearded dragon. It thought that it was camouflaged so well that it didn't even acknowledge us until Steve poked it with a stick. I have a great video of it turning and looking to check Steve out, but I can't upload it to Weebly because I'd have to pay for my subscription... Anyways I'll try to find a way to upload that to Facebook at some point. The other interesting animal we say is a type of owl called a Tawny Fogmouth. The first time Steve pointed one out to me a couple of weeks ago I couldn't even pick it out from the tree bark because it was camouflaged so well, but this time it was sitting out on the branch and very easy to spot. Steve said likely would stay there all day and night even if people walked very close to the tree. Tuesday evening was the first parent-teacher interview night (there is another Thursday) and since prac teachers typically don't sit in for the interviews Zach and I helped out by running the barbie. The school sponsors teachers at Orphanage in Cambodia and all of the proceeds from the sausage sizzle went to those teachers. Apparently the teachers only earn about $150 USD per month in Cambodia, and over the two hours of selling sausages and kebabs we raised enough to pay for one month for one teacher. It was a fun time because we got to meet some of the parents of our students and serve up some delicious grub at the same time! So Jacqui took Zach and I up to Brisbane (about 2 hours North from where I'm staying) to watch her son play Rugby and show us around. I've attached all of the photos we took in the beautiful city! We went to the Brisbane Museum first and checked out all of the exhibits. There was cool stuff about the marine life as well as some of the awesome paleontology finds in Australia. After the quick trip through the museum we went to the rugby game. Jacqui's son Jake plays Rugby Union, which is one of 3 kinds of rugby (or football) played in Australia. The game was really fun to watch, although I had to turn to Jacqui and ask questions every time the ref blew the whistle. Rugby Union and Rugby League are played all over the world, and are basically what you think of when you think of rugby. The third is called Australian Rules Football, or just "footie", and it is exclusive to Australia (I think New Zealand might have a team or two). I won't bother trying to explain how that game works, but it is my favorite from what I've watched so far. Union is a good game as well, but I think Aussie Rules Footie is top-notch and it a very Aussie sport. Anyway after the game we walked through Brisbane and checked out some of the buildings in different parts of the city. We also went into the Brisbane City Hall where they had another museum about Brisbane on the 3rd floor. The Brisbane river (which the city is named after) has been crucial to commerce and daily life in Brisbane for over 150 years and so the museum highlighted the different important features of the river. We learned that Brisbane flood quite often, the most recent in 2011, and some of the floods have been up to the second story of the buildings. After walking through town we walked through the shops and markets on South Bank. We finally wrapped up our evening in the Valley (or Chinatown) with some delicious Chinese food. Overall is was a great time in Brisbane and it was nice to get to know Jacqui a little bit better in the process. I'm looking forward to checking out Australia's other major cities later during my stay here! I was wanting to post something this week, but nothing to crazy is going on so I thought I would share a little bit about one of my favorite parts about Australia so far. Sure the beautiful sites and lovely people are great, but having a morning or afternoon tea brings me a lot of joy. So, I guess that seems kind of strange for me to be so jazzed about some black tea, but the best part is, having a morning or afternoon "tea" has very little to do with tea and everything to do with eating and chatting with friends. Let me give you an example.
During my first week at Byron, Steve mentioned in the morning on our drive to work that a recently retired faculty member named Vicky was going to be stopping in for the day and he thought it would be nice if we picked up some stuff for afternoon tea. So we stopped by the local grocery store and I figured he'd pick up some tea and maybe some biscuits (cookies) to go with it. What we walked out of the store with was: a block of cheese, crackers, grapes, and a whole white cake (notice no tea was involved so far). We get in the car and finish the drive to school and I am just imagining that there is tea in the science faculty room and that we will just make due with what is there. So it gets to 11 am when the whole school goes on recess (just a 20 minute break, enough time for a snack), and Steve asks the faculty to hang around for some morning tea. Not only do we break out the goodies I mentioned before, but another teacher has brought some passion fruit cheese cake. So we sit around and chat with Vicky and her husband Mick (also a teacher at the school) and have a lovely time. I got a chance to share with all of them my experience to that point, and Vicky told us some great stories from years gone by. We feasted for the whole 20 minutes devouring the cheese, crackers, cheesecake and grapes. Oh yeah, no tea involved whatsoever... Another time we were all called for morning tea was also during recess last week. I'm told to bring 5 dollars for morning tea. Seems a little pricey for a simple cup of black tea, but wait morning "tea" has deceived me before. So we walked into the staff room, I pay my five dollars and before me is a beautiful bevy of chocolate cake, platters of fruit, cheese, veggies, sausage rolls and so much more. There were three full tables of food for the staff of the whole school (around 60 teachers). For about 10 minutes I followed the lead of the other science faculty and completely stuffed my face with some amazing coffee cake and fruit, and then it was time for the main event. The real reason people were at the morning tea (though I was happy with the delicious food) was for the raffle. The prizes were a few bottles of wine, a week of parking in the deputy principle's car park, and having the principle of the school teach one of your lessons. The prizes started to dwindle and by no surprise I hadn't won anything, but then suddenly, "Next up, number 29!" Hey that was me! I quickly scooped up my bottle of wine and decided morning tea is the greatest thing ever. Oh yeah, also no tea at this one either. After the first morning tea with Vicky and the Science faculty I asked Steve about what exactly the criteria for "morning tea" was, as there didn't seem to be any tea present at the gathering. He said something like, "Oh yeah, morning tea is all about cakes and cheese and delicious teats, the tea isn't so important, so long as everyone is happy and having a nice time". So there ya go, apparently if you've got tea at your "tea" that just an added bonus. At Steve's house we usually have tea or coffee for breakfast (or brekky), usually a cuppa (cup of tea) right when we get home after school, and then one immediately following dinner. I've now learned the difference between having tea and having a cuppa, and I love both because it's all about settling down, even for 10 minutes, to catch up with everyone and relax. Aussie really love the connections they make with people and sometimes you just have to share a cup of tea with each other to make that connection. I'd recommend anyone who feels stressed or busy to take 10 minutes and have a cuppa with an Aussie, it really is a wonderful time. Cheers! Carly and Steve took us to to a couple of waterfalls about 20 minutes away from Ballina. The first was called Maron falls, and the second was called Dalwood falls. Zach, Steve, and I checked the depth beneath the falls, and decided to take the plunge. It was an absolutely beautiful trip into the Australian countryside, and I hope we're able to go back again for another visit. For those keeping track, unfortunately I was unable to find a platypus, but we did spot a handful of huge spiders at Dalwood. I managed to get a decent shot of the golden orb spider which was enormous, and apparently is extremely venomous and spins webs which are the material they make Kevlar vests out of. This last Wednesday I went snorkeling with the students at Julian rocks. I don't have an underwater camera, but a few of the girls I have in my Year 10 class had cameras and were nice enough to give me the photos they took. They lots of photos and I just uploaded everything they gave me (even the blurry ones). I'm still very impressed with the autonomy of the students here, they let Year 8 students snorkel by themselves so long as they had a buddy. I can't imagine students back home being allowed to snorkel quite like the way we did Wednesday, because of all the legal implications of letting kids do that in the ocean. In this gallery of photos you'll see quite a few different kinds of fish, turtles, leopard sharks, wobbygongs, and some rays. I wish that I had had a camera too because at one point in the same field of view I could see a leopard shark, sea turtle, stingray, and several colorful fish, which was an incredible view. After this trip am now very excited about when Zach and I will travel to Cairns to check out the Great Barrier Reef. The water there is warmer, clearer and full of even more exotic life! So Zach, Steve and I went for a nice trip this last weekend to a City just south of Sydney, called Wollongong. We were going to meet some former students of Steve's for a party, and we stayed with Steve's sister Elyse. We flew from Byron to Sydney on Saturday morning and then rented a car to make the short drive down the coast. Wollongong was an absolutely beautiful town, just behind this geological feature called escarpment. It is a small mountainous ridge that runs from the coast to the backside of Wollongong. Sunday morning after a quick breakfast with Elyse and her husband, Steve took us to Kiama, which is a small suburb of Wollongong and was also very scenic. Small tropical storms on the north side of Australia sent larger than usual swells downs to the beautiful beaches in Kiama. After we left the bayside, Steve took us into the country side, and it was unique to see the farmland juxtaposed with the beaches so closely. It looked a little bit like France mixed with Florida. The lush green rolling were mixed with palm trees, it was the weirdest thing. Once we got to the top of the lookout at the top of Saddle Back Mountain, we had an amazing view of the country side and we even heard an amazing bird called a lyrebird. I couldn't get a video of it making it's call, but check out this David Attenborough video of one. It made noises very similar to the one in the video (without the car alarm, or chain saw) including the Kookaburra. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjE0Kdfos4Y All in all it was a fantastic weekend and I would recommend it checking out south of Sydney if you ever get the chance! Rather than include all of the pictures as part of this update, I just made a gallery, and you can check out the whole lot of them. Here are a few of the photos I promised from when Zach and I climbed up to the light house in Byron Bay. Apparently back in 2008 the Prime Minister of Australia made an official apology to the Indigenous people of Australia, also know as the Aboriginal people. Posted a few places around the school are copies of this apology. I'm not exactly sure how well this apology was received my the indigenous people still left in Australia, and I hope to learn more about that situation as I go.
Zach, his host mom Jacqui, and I went to a touring group of Aboriginal dancer's performance in Byron Bay tonight and it was an extremely interesting experience. At first the group started out with extremely traditional dance, where the men were painted and carrying spears accompanied by didgeridoos and hectic singing. Soon after they broke into some modern Jazz, and followed by everything from Michael Jackson, to MC Hammer, to "Who Let the Dogs Out". It was a really wild show and it seemed to show that despite their strong desire to hold onto their heritage, these guys feel that their people can not only participate in modern Australian society, but also contribute to its rich culture. I still don't know what to think of the performance, but I know I enjoyed myself.
As I mentioned, we went snorkeling on Wednesday with about 25 students and the ocean was crystal clear. This is the main beach in Byron Bay, and we went just off shore to a small ship wreck to snorkel. We saw a handful of different kinds of fish including a puffer fish and a small shark called a wobbygong. The bit of land you can see poking out into the water is Cape Byron, and the most easterly part of Australia. Wednesday afternoon I went with Zach and his host mom Jacqui on a small hike to the top of the Cape where there is a famous light house. I took pictures, but they are on Jacqui's camera, so I will have to wait until I see her again to upload those. This Saturday, Steve took me for my first attempt at surfing. I was lucky enough that one of the teachers at school is letting me borrow her husband's surfboard at the moment so that I can learn to surf. One my first try we couldn't find a beach with good swells, it was a bit too choppy everywhere we looked. We tried to surf in this small inlet where the waves were slightly too small, but it was a good place to learn to paddle and find by balance on the board. I did manage to stand up on the board a few times, but by no means did I "catch a wave". Hopefully this morning will be a little better, but after reading the surf report, things aren't looking so good. What's nice though, its that there are about 5 beaches each within about a 10 minute drive from one another in Ballina (which is where I am staying). If our luck doesn't pan out, I guess I'll have to just relax on the beach and catch some much needed sun. Last night I went with Steve and Carly to play trivia at a local Red Cross Station. We met up with one of the teachers from school and her group of friends and they were lovely people. This trivia night was the inaugural night, so we weren't sure what to expect. The event was BYOB so at least we were able to have some beer while I pretended to know anything about Aussie trivia. It was quite an interesting night, most interesting was that the announcer they hired sounded like he had tried to swallow a jar of peanut butter before he started reading the trivia questions. At first I thought it was my untrained ear that couldn't pick up on his thick Aussie accent, but everyone else at the event was complaining about this guys (lack of) announcing prowess. Despite his blatantly subpar performance, we managed to have a good time, because there were some entertaining events sprinkled in. There was the competition to win a bottle of Jack and Coke, which I think would have been required to be able to understand the announcer. An 80s tribute complete with outfits and terrible dance moves. I supposed the Aussies like to relive that decade about as much as we do in the States. And there was the ever popular paper-plane competition, which I completely failed at. Overall, it was a really fun night and also the money to get into the venue as well as the money to buy raffles and enter the competitions all went to a local elementary school, so that was nice.
Hopefully soon I will have more pictures from us climbing to the top of Cape Byron and others soon. I am going to start teaching full time this week after a proper introduction with the students, so that should be a nice time. So yesterday was quite the busy day, Steve and I went to school for my second full day at school. I've got it worked out now what classes I'll be teaching which is good, and I finally got some pictures of the way the school is laid out which is pretty cool. The whole campus is outside; that is each classroom is it's own room and to talk between them, you have to go outside. The windows in all of the rooms are open and the fans go constantly to make sure it doesn't get too hot in there, but apparently since I've been here it's been very comfortable out, so I guess that's lucky! Steve also took me to the beach after school (my apologies for not snapping a photo of the beach) and we got a chance to swim in the surf for a bit. The power of the Pacific Ocean even on a relatively calm day like yesterday was about twice as strong as I've seen before so that was interesting to say the least.
And finally, Steve took me for my first driving lesson on the local roads, but it was out of the fire and into the frying pan, because in my first lesson he had me cruising through roundabouts, and even on the highway going 100 kph (I'll let you practice the conversion to mph). My instincts about driving were all thrown out of whack, but after about 30 minutes I reckon I've got the basics down. Today I get to go snorkeling with the school as part of something they call "sport" which is essentially school wide gym class. I will be one of the helping teachers and I guess I have to get in the water with the kids and snorkel, which is a huge bummer. Oh wait never mind, no it's not, I'm feeling so very lucky already in this experience and will hopefully have more pictures soon. |