A Broad Abroad: Belated Update

I'm so sorry I haven't posted in a few days! It's been insane, but amazing! I'll go day by day.

Thursday: Boring day but fantastic night. It was Megan Jackson's birthday so we went out hardcore. After taking (and acing!) my quiz I showered and got dressed in my new outfit for her birthday dinner and drinks at Cargo. I got a beautiful black banded high-waisted skirt and a gray shirt with gold coin detailing around the collar. I wore black tights, my Tory Burch leather jacket, and my black peep toed heels. I felt really, really good and was so excited to go out. We all left for Cargo around 8:15pm after giving Megan her cake and singing happy birthday. She was so surprised! The lounge was fantastic - they gave us two bottles of free champagne to start us off and were more than willing to take pictures of all us screaming girls. We started off with $5 champagne cocktails and then went to Pimms Lemonade after the promotion ended. It was fantastic just to hang out with all the girls, have some cocktails, and laugh all night. It was so, so much fun. I chatted up the bartender all night, being a big idiot. LoL But towards the end of the night I met a great guy named Ben. We talked for an hour while everybody else was dancing and drinking and we ended up exchanging numbers. It was a fantastic, fun, exciting night that I'm so glad I was a part of. Great friends, great time!

Friday: After all of our excitement we all felt a little under the weather Friday so I laid low, got some yellow curry (my new favorite hangover food)for lunch and then packed for Surf Camp. After some sushi, gelato, and a two hour bus ride we arrived at camp and all crashed pretty hard. It wasn't very eventful except that before I left I finally received my new cell phone which means I can again BBM, text, and receive calls from the US - so call me! Plus my mom sent me a beautiful card and a picture of the two of us from my senior photos. It's old, but I'm glad I have it here.

Saturday: Up bright and early to learn how to surf! After a big breakfast we all got fitted for wet suits and learned how to carry our boards down to the beach. Let me tell you, they are not light! Man, I was tired just from carrying the 9 foot board all the way from our cabins to the beach. We split into groups - our leaders being Shane (Shane-o), John (John-o) and 14-year old Brett (Brett-o) - and started the slow but positive process of learning how to surf. We started on the beach and got the basics down, how to paddle, how to get in the right position, where our feet were supposed to go. It was hard, my hip is really restrictive in some ways, surfing apparently being one of them. It's almost impossible to bend the way it needs to so I can pop up on the board. It was really messing with my position and how I needed to learn to stand. We started mostly with just pushing ourselves up onto our knees - which I proceeded to do most of the day despite learning how to stand in our second lesson. Thankfully, the instructors are really great and recognized my issues pretty fast. Shane-o saw me struggling and showed me a different way to come up, a slight modification for my hip since it was really starting to bug me. After that, I totally was able to get up. Mind you, these are tiny waves and my balance still wasn't perfect but I rode some in! We had a great time in both of our lessons - a total of six hours in the water. It was exhausting! We had a big dinner and some ice cream after much-needed showers. In the evening we got a slide show of our first day and laughed at how ridiculous most of us looked. Seriously, wet suits plus wobbly uni students equals some hilarious faces - guys and girls! Some people went out to the pub after dinner but our group decided to crash, which we totally did.

Sunday: Woke up bright and early again! Another big breakfast, though a little slower this time as we were sooooore. We went out again in the morning and this time I was much more successful! I rode so many! It was so exciting - being in the water, the waves, being with friends. It's amazing. Most people know I'm a total fish - ocean, lake, pool, once I'm in you can't get me out and this was no exception. The water was cold but it was so refreshing, especially because it was about ten degrees hotter today than it was on Saturday. I love the ocean. Even if I hadn't been surfing I would've enjoyed myself just being in such blue, beautiful water on Seven Mile Beach. I know it's not the most intense surf, but it was a great learning experience. We had a great lunch - Australian way to eat burgers = beet, pineapple, and sweet chili sauce, SO GOOD - and afterward we went back out for our last surf. I was really satisfied with my morning surf and the waves were nearly nonexistent so we all just messed around - lined our surfboards up and walked across them in the water, made a fort with the boards and tried to keep people off, and yelled at the instructors to do tricks on the waves that managed to appear every once in awhile. It was so much fun to watch them surf, too. We had one last wave (which I rode then face planted in the shallow water) and sprinted back to camp to get showers in before our second two hour bus ride. I slept most of the way back to Sydney then we went to Scubar with the group for free pizza and beer. Most of us were exhausted so we had a piece of pizza or two, a sip of beer, and bailed. I'm still sore, my shoulders are killing me from paddling and my legs are wobbly from all the work. I'm glad I have Pilates on Tuesday!

All in all it was an amazing, unforgettable weekend. A bunch of us are planning on taking another weekend during our internship to go to Surf Camp again because we had such an amazing time and we want more practice! It was so much fun - going out for Megan's birthday, the day after curry hangover food, surfing all weekend, and just enjoying my time in Australia. This week is pretty low key: laundry, paper writing, dinner with Ben, and then The Outback over the weekend! I'll post as much as I can and if anything exciting happens you'll be the first to know. :)