Goodbye Woodduck, Hello G'day!

We woke up late knowing that we could reserve another night in our run-down, unpopular hostel, but those thoughts quickly went down the drain. After breakfast we walked to the reception desk where the manager told us that no, he would not be able to book us for another 3 nights since Mardi Gras, Australia style, is this weekend and everyone is booked. Terror and worry about what to do ran through our minds as we looked at each other with disbelief. Fortunately, before panic really stuck he informed us that he had room in his other hostel that was right down the road. With relief we asked him to book us for the hostel, and with that being said the real fun started: packing all our stuff! We had both found housing the previous day (guess that should be a post all in itself!) so we were sure that we could manage to live at another hostel for just 3 days. Nonetheless packing and then carrying our luggage up the street, then down another street was challenging to say the least! But when we finally arrived we were glad to see that this hostel looked 10 times better than the other hostel. The rooms were set up different, making it appear more clean and orderly as well as the bathrooms being single stalled with one shower instead of one bathroom with 5 toilets and 5 showers. The kitchen was also bigger, along with the TV room and backyard patio. Although this may sound all fine and dandy, it’s still not the luxury life, or as good as it seems. Knowing we were settled in for now we quickly took showers so we could head to the university for some orientation week events. We both agreed that the 45 minute walk to the university was getting old, although it is great exercise! And when we say walk, Lauren tends to walk like she’s competing for the gold medal in the Olympics. Maybe that was due to the pouring rain outside, or the fact that we were running late for a meeting (that ended up being at a later time) but either way I was running to catch up with her. The first stop was of course the library again (we think the security guard is tired of seeing us) to get internet and check on a couple of things. With an hour to now spare until the meeting about casual work in Australia we wasted it away on the internet finalizing and staying on top of a few things. Once the time came we headed off to the “Looking for Casual Work” meeting that didn’t quite measure up to our expectations. We think the meeting was more geared towards new students right out of high school who have never held a job before since the information was so basic. We made note of a few things and may look into the option of finding work here since the minimum wage is so high but haven’t fully decided. We headed back to the library so Lauren could talk to her Mum (that’s how they say mom is Australia) and started on what seems to be the never-ending search…for bikes this time. Unsuccessful though since bikes seem to go really fast here we decided it was time to wrap up for the day. Walking back through the Broadway shopping centre we took a few leisurely walks through Target, Kmart, and this Reject Store (that did not have as good of deals as we were hoping for) then finally to Bi-Lo and Coles to pick up vegetables for dinner. Once the vegetables were obtained and we were ready to head back to the hostel we noticed a stranded umbrella staring us down while it called for help since it was broken. Being the good citizens that we are, we decided to check and see if the umbrella was ok. Luckily, the umbrella was big and barely damaged (easily fixed with just a couple tricks) and it accompanied us back on the windy trip back to the hostel. With the wind being strong at times we put the umbrella away since it wasn’t even worth fighting with. Ten feet from the hostel, standing under a traffic light waiting for the light to turn, I asked if Lauren wanted the umbrella back out. Her response was “Yeah sure, I guess.” In girl language ‘yes you better take out the umbrella,’ so the gentleman that I was I took out the umbrella and proceeded to open it when the unthinkable happened. Not even halfway open a blustering wind ripped the top cover of the umbrella off leaving me leaving me standing with just the metal spokes. While I watched the cover roll into traffic I slowly turned to Lauren “You made this happen.” Lauren looked just as confused and bewildered as I did but after looking after each other we quickly burst into laughter. When else would that ever happen to an umbrella, only in movies when people have such horrible luck. Once the light turned for us to walk we ran the rest of the way to the hostel in amazement, thinking about what the other people in their cars just witnessed. With our stomachs growling we dropped our stuff in the rooms and made our way to the semi-crowded kitchen to finish the rest of the unstuffed peppers that we had saved!