Hello Everyone! Sorry I've taken such a long break from the blogging world. I have officially survived my mid semester exams (hopefully I passed them all too) and now I'm enjoying my second Spring Break of 2014!
Even though I spent a lot of the past few weeks studying, I still got out for a little adventuring. A couple weekends ago I went down to Bondi Beach to enjoy the sun and check out the Festival of the Winds.
Festival of the winds is basically a festival devoted to kite flying. So the sky was filled with kites. It was really cool to look down the entire beach and see the sky dotted with specs of color. And some of the bigger kites that were anchored on the beach were beautiful. There was also an airplane writing messages in the sky. I happened to look up in time to see the message "real men cook." It was a beautiful day and it is definitely now warm enough to jump in the ocean without a wetsuit!
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| So many kites! |
My favorite adventure over the past few weeks was my discovery of a bagel shop in Surry Hills. Bagels aren't something you get at a cafe here and only rarely can you buy a package of them at the grocery store. Cream cheese is easily found though so I'm always wondering how its so popular without bagels.
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| A taste of home! |
Bagels have always been one of my favourite foods and for me 2 months is a long time to go without a bagel. Also you silly Americans post too much about the Bagel Market and the Bagelry. (You post way too much about pumpkin spice too, another thing Australia doesn't have. So if you could so kindly stop reminding me that I'm missing the season of pumpkin spice lattes that would be great!) Apparently I was a little too excited when I ordered my everything bagel with jalapeno cream cheese because the barista actually asked me why I was I was smiling so much. I think they were also wondering why I walked all the way to their great cafe for just the bagel and didn't even bother ordering one of their amazing coffees. All in all my $5 bagel was well worth it and I'm sorry that you just had to read a paragraph devoted to a bagel.
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| It tasted like heaven! |
Besides the kites and bagel most of my days were spent in the library studying away. Exams turned out to be an adventure of their own though. Most mid semester exams are worth 20% to 40% of your total grade so they're a pretty big deal. And because they're a big deal they're taken very seriously. My exams weren't even held on campus. I had to walk 15 minutes to Wentworth Park (a greyhound racing stadium). UTS clears out the building and fills it with desks, about 1000 on each of the two floors.
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| What a beautiful place to take exams... |
To get into the building you are required to know your specific seat number and your ID has to be out at all times. Once you're at your desk you have to fill out and sign an attendance sheet that is collected when one of the 20 proctors confirms your ID. Cellphones had to be off because if they ring during an exam you get an automatic zero and can be excluded from UTS (aka expelled) for exam misconduct. Watches had to be taken off but could be left on the desk. Calculator covers had to be left on the floor. No hats and only bottled water was permitted. Any bag bigger than a backpack (think gym bag) had to be left at the front of the room. My exams were each 2 hours and 10 minutes long. You weren't permitted to leave your seat during the first 90 minutes of the exam and you weren't allowed to leave during the last 15 minutes of the exam either. Basically the whole process was intense. One of my exams was open notes and I spent more time worrying that I would be kicked out of the exam for having too many notes than actually preparing for the exam. Thankfully I wasn't kicked out. But exams are done! Since midsemester break isn't really in the middle of the semester I only have 4 more weeks of classes before I get to do it all again!
Okay, I'll stop boring you now. This morning, on my first day of vacation, I got up with the sun and picked two of my favourite people up at the airport! My Big and Double Big have made it to Australia! I got to spend all day with them and it still doesn't feel real! They got to walk across the Harbour Bridge, go to Luna Park, the Opera House, the Royal Botanic Gardens, and see a Footy game all after traveling for over 24 hours. I'm pretty sure they were about to fall asleep standing up by the time we got home from the game. We have some awesome adventures planned for their time here and I promise you that you'll hear about all of it!
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| At the footy game! |
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