To start, last Tuesday I went to a "family dinner" in some of my friends apartment. Once a week, they invite over a bunch of people to cook and eat a meal together. This past week, I'd say the theme was Australian barbeque... complete with sausages, steak, and hamburgers. My friends, Wado and Anthea, were the chefs this week; Anthea made an awesome potato with cheese dish (similar to au gratin potatoes) and Wado made pavlova, a signature Australian cake-like dessert. Anthea told me her family often eats this dessert on Christmas... as they all sit on the beach. Huh... much different than Christmas in 'ol CNY.
The pavlova Wado made looked really similar to this (see link below for a wonderful description of this scrumptious dish).
On Thursday night, my roommate Madeline, my other friend Gabby, and I went to Exeter, a town approximately two hours away from Wollongong. Madeline told me a few weeks ago there was a really great glow worm dell in Exeter... so we took a little over-night trip to go see them (see post from NZ to find out what a glow worm dell is). We took the free shuttle bus to the train station where we would catch a bus to Exeter... however, things got a little tricky when we saw the bus we were supposed to be riding stopped at a red light (after we had gotten off the free shuttle, and were standing on the sidewalk). So the three of us were standing on the sidewalk, motioning to the bus driver (stopped at the red light in the middle of traffic) that we needed to get on the bus driver. The driver must have been having a good day or something because he opened the door to talk to us... "Where are you guys heading to?" "We need to go to Exeter!!"... and after a few moments of thinking, "Well you better hurry up and get on the bus!" So we crossed a busy lane of traffic to hop on the bus after it had already left the station... thank God for that bus driver! Probably could have gotten fired for doing that. Anyway, two hours later, we got off the bus at Exeter... a tiny town in the middle of miles of Australian farm land. The town population is actually around 400; they have one post-office and one general store. C Square doesn't seem so small anymore, does it? Madeline's dad is from Australia, so she has a ton of family here. We walked to her aunt and uncle's house (who live in Exeter); she also has two cousins who live there (a boy and a girl, approximately Collin's and my age, respectively). As soon as her aunt opened the door, I knew it was going to be a night well spent. Her aunt was wearing an apron and the smell of beef stroganoff wafted out the door. Deni, Madeline's aunt, busied herself at the counter cutting carrots and broccoli for our dinner; she was so welcoming and friendly. Madeline's uncle, Matthew, was also very welcoming. We all talked around the counter as dinner cooked and continued to talk as we ate dinner (which was like heaven in a bowl... I forgot how good food is not from a dining hall). Matthew drove us to the glow worm dell around 9:00 p.m. and for 45 minutes, Gabby, Madeline, and I walked down to the dell and looked at all the glow worms. Peak glow worm viewing time is from December to February (the Australian summer), but there was still a ton of glow worms to look at. While we were waiting for Matthew to pick us back up, we saw a wombat running across the road and into the bushes! My first wombat sighting! It looked like a small, but really thick-muscled, dog. Apparently, according to Matthew, they could really mess up a car if you ran in to one. After arriving back at their home, we drank apple cinnamon tea and ate cupcakes. Get cuter Harden family. We went to bed and got up the next morning at 6:00 a.m. to catch the bus back to Wollongong. And yes, we made it on time.
Wombat.
Yesterday, Saturday, I went to the UOW men's soccer game. There's actually three teams (an A, B, and C team), so we watched most of the B and A team games. I went with Madeline and my friends Robbie, Will, Justin, and Zach. After watching the soccer game, we went back to Robbie's apartment and made dinner--an Aussie style bbq again! However, in addition to hamburgers and steak, we had shrimp! Not that I'm a big shrimp lover... but we literally did "throw some shrimp on the barbie." Turned out really delicious.
Today, I went to Madeline's soccer game. She's on the girls B team. She was so excited that I came to her game! But that's what good friends do, right? : ) Besides that, I've been studying for a Spanish exam that I have tomorrow.
For some reason, the internet isn't working very well so I can't upload any of my photos to my blog... so I'll do that soon when the internet is working again.
Tengo estudiar para mi examen de espanol. Espero que mi examen esta facil. Felicitaciones si usted cuenta de lo que esto dice.
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