Tuesday, January 18, 2011

The Apartment

We have furniture!!!!!!!

9 weeks after arriving in Australia we finally have furniture in our apartment.  No more sleeping on an air mattress (or getting yelled at while carrying a blown-up air mattress from Matt's aparmtent to our apartment - "yeah, you and your air mattress get out of here!!").  Along with the furniture I am also so happy to have kitchenware, diet mountain dew, and the rest of my shoes! It truly is the little things in life :)

Our furniture was delivered last Monday morning, which conveniently coincided with our first day back at work so that I could ease back into work with only a halfday.  I started opening boxes while the movers were still carrying things in. I wanted to make sure that my Diet Mountain Dew arrived safely.  I immediately texted a picture to Kelly to prove to her that it actually made it.  We are not crazy we just really like our Diet Mountain Dew.  Now that I know it made it through customs I wish I would have shipped about 100 more of them.  Eight each is not going to last very long!

This weekend we went to Ikea to complete our apartment.  We purchased a coffee table, TV stand, and shelves.  The apartment finally looks like home!  We just need a few more pictures on the wall, a bigger TV, and a washing machine and we will be all set.

Here is a picture of the living room:


Notice the sandstone bowl on the coffee table from Kenya- my favorite travel purchase!

As most of you would expect my bed is not made and there are clothes on the floor so no bedroom picture at the moment.  I'll try to post one soon. My "new" headboard looks quite nice (my old headboard spray painted black by my wonderful mama).  There are also lots of pictures to remind me of home!

Of course no apartment would be complete without a few mishaps - here are a few of ours:
  • Returning from Fiji I discovered that the carpet in the corner of my bedroom was slightly damp.  A fan did no good drying it out so I called the landlord on Monday morning.  Turns out a pipe had burst in the apartment above me.  Amazingly only a bit of paint on the wall bubbled up and the wet carpet was discoverd before my furniture arrived so nothing was ruined.
  • Also upon our return from Fiji we noticed the fridge was making a VERY loud humming sound.  Over the next few days the temperature continued to increase in the fridge until it was not cold at all - although the freezer was still working.  That too eventually died.  We had bought the fridge secondhand so we were nervous we were going to have to buy a new one.  Luckily Kelly contacted the guy we had purchased it from and he came to fix it last night (at 10 pm).
  • As I mentioned above we made a few Ikea purchases this weekend - coffee table, TV stand, and shelves -all in black-brown.  We are grown up now and thought we should actually have matching furniture. Our items were delivered Monday morning.  Turns out our TV stand is white and not black-brown.  At Ikea the home delivery counter is after the checkout, which means that we had to wheel our purchase over to home delivery so there is little chance that we can blame this on the Ikea staff.  Although we are going to continue to try.  This is one time that not having a car is pretty annoying as we now have to figure out how to get it back to the store and exchange it.
  • We finally got internet set up in the apartment.  We paid $150 for installation (basically a guy coming to the apartment and telling us the internet was already on).  Unfortunately after that we couldn't get the internet to work.  We finally got through to customer service and got the internet connected (we were using the wrong password - even though the directions told us the password was admin! how were we supposed to know?).  I then asked them to help us set up the wireless - since I am POSITIVE that I ordered a wireless modem  Turns out our modem is not wireless so we have to figure out if we can return that as well.
Other than that we love our apartment (although Kelly is dying with only 5 TV channels).  We are planning on having a housewarming party in February so there will be more pictures then.

Other news from the weekend:
Friday night after work I had drinks with my start group.  Good to see everyone after we were all doing our own thing over Christmas break.  It was gorgeous outside and we sat outside at Beer Deluxe in Federation Square - after dinner drinks turning into most of the night drinks. Beer Deluxe has a great burger and fries for only $10.50 - cheap as chips!  And it was the biggest burger ever.

Saturday night Kelly and I went out to eat with some girls from PwC.  We went to Mamasita's - a family-style Mexican restaurant in the city.  I'll admit I was a little skeptical - how good can Mexican food be so far away from Mexico?  I was wrong - It was amazing!  The shrimp taco and mexican truffle quesadilla were my favorite - and the margarita! The food definitely was worth the wait (Amy put our name in at 6 and we got a table around 8:30).  The restaurant actually took our number and we could go somewhere else and get drinks and then they call you shortly before the table is going to be ready. I swear that would never happen in the US!  Way better than standing in line on the stairs leading up to the restaurant like a lot of people were doing.  While we waited for our table we had some drinks at Society on Bourke Street.  Of course the waiter and the owner instantly fell in love with Amy and gave her 9 free drink tickets. 

After dinner we went to Society where Amy's friendliness scored all 7 of us 3 drinks each.  Thanks for that Amy - I need to go out with you more often!

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

The Start of 2011

Another new experience since moving to Australia - 100+ degrees for New Years Eve!
Most of the bars in Melbourne had really expensive cover charges for NYE and because we had a flight at 9 a.m. on the 1st we didn't really want to spend a lot of money to get in somewhere if we couldn't maximize on our money.  Luckily Emma graciously hosted us all at her apartment before going to see the fireworks at midnight. Emma and Rockey were great hosts (I especially liked the pineapple and cheese!!) and even if some of the beer may have "disappeared" I hope they will still invite most of us back soon :)

Here are a few pictures from the night:
Kelly, Emma, and I

Fireworks over the EY building
Thanks to Kelly I made it home before 4 a.m. and made it to my flight.  Thanks Kel :)

Before we get to Fiji I thought I would take a look back at 2010:

Places Lived:
  • Uptown with Rachelle
  • Bloomington with Ben and Erin
  • Prairie City for 2 weeks
  • Serviced apartments in Melbourne for one month
  • St. Kilda West AUSTRALIA
 Places Visited
  • Waco/San Antonio, TX - I got to see where my friend Katie lives/works in Waco and well as attend the wedding of my friend Danika and her new hubby Troy!  Such a fun wedding - even if I was unprepared for the cold front that hit Texas right when we arrived
  • Frederick, MD/Washington DC - Mini Contiki Reunion with Kim and Kelly.  I think I remember all the food we ate the most :)
  • Many trips to Iowa to see friends and family - Hopkins family reunion, my cousin Staci's wedding, and young adult retreat at Camp Pine Lake -  to name a few
  • Gap Adventures trip to Africa - countries visited: Zambia, Malawi, Tanzania, and Kenya.  Travelled with Kim, Annie, and Bel and met AMAZING people on our trip.  I was lucky enough to meet Justin, Kiz, and Carlee who are all close by to my new home. I love travel friends!
  • Seoul, South Korea to visit Amber, Jon, and Lincoln. I want to go back just for the bulgogi hot pot!
  • AUSTRALIA!!!! 
  • Fiji with Kelly, Matt, and Amy (Keep reading to find out more) - oh shoot we technically didn't arrive here until Jan. 1 but I'm keeping on the list to make it more impressive
New experiences 
  • Petting a lion
  • Getting a smartphone!
  • Spending Christmas away from home :(
  • Riding in a helicopter
  • Relying solely on public transporation to get around
  • Quitting a job (other than those due to school)
  • probably many, many more that I am forgetting!

Fiji - the part you have all been waiting for (I'm sure you are all still wondering how we got stranded on an island - yes, we were STRANDED)

We arrived in Fiji on the evening of Jan. 1 and were greeted by rain and overcast skies.  We had seen the forecast was for rain the entire time we were in Fiji so we were a litle prepared for this.   A private transfer took us from the airport to The Pearl Resort on the Pacific Coast - about a 2.5 hour trip.  We got McDonald's on the way and then all fell asleep :)

For someone who is used to staying in hostels, tents, or very cheap hotels, this resort was luxurious!!  We spent 3 days at The Pearl. Luckily the weather forecast was wrong and it was gorgeous the entire time we were here! My time there was spent laying by the pool, reading, sitting at the swim-up pool bar, eating, drinking, and getting a massage!  What a relaxing vacation so far!


The Resort

Happy Hour!
 Next up - Beachcomber Island
Several people had told us to go to Beachcomber Island - also known as the party island.  Not that we are finally off the island none of us can remember who told us to go there.  Beachcomber island is tiny.  There is just one small resort and you could probably walk around the whole island in 10 minutes (I never tried the sand hurt my feet too much).

We got to the island around mid-day and got some lunch and drinks (it is the party island after all).  As I said the island is tiny, we were staying in a 16+ bed dorm and I needed a break from the sun.....so the only logic place to hang out was the bar.  We also played some volleyball a little later which I think led to the destruction of the bottom of my feet.

The party island lived up to its name and even though I lost my sandals and the key to my dorm bed, I would say it was definitely worth it for one night.  At 9:45 we were supposed to leave for Mana Island.  We boarded a small boat with several other people leaving the island.  The small boat was supposed to take us to the ferry that would take us on to Mana Island.  When we got on the small boat we could see the ferry waiting.  But then it just left! Hey -how can it do that!  The driver of our boat didn't seem to concerned.  He just nonchalantly said "that's your boat, maybe it will come back."  But it just kept going!  We went back to Beachcomber and were told that we could get the next ferry at 1:00. Not ideal since we had already checked out of our room, hadn't showered, and were just ready to get off the party island.  But 1:00 didn't sound so bad.  Beachcomber doesn't have any restaurants (breakfast, lunch, and dinner are included in the price and are all one hour long...you don't want to miss it).  There was a small stand that had grilled cheese and hot dogs so I had two grilled cheese sandwiches to tide me over :)
Shortly before 1:00 we were told that there was no ferry coming at 1:00 and we could get the 6:00 ferry.  None of us were too happy although the staff didn't seem to care. After all we were on "Fiji Time."
We did get the 6:00 ferry to Mana - after it nearly drove right past us. 
After reading this description you are all probably still thinking it wasn't that bad - I guess you just had to be there.  Kelly, Matt, and Amy understand my pain :)


Not much to repot about Mana.  The island was a little bigger than Beachcombers but was only one resort.  We stayed in bungalows right on the ocean.  Sadly it did rain the only full day we had at Mana (we lost one day due to being STRANDED on Beachcombers).  Amy and I got our second couple's massage (not sure why they kept putting us in the same room).  This time we got wraps - my first ever.  And another scalp massage....my favorite :)



The view from our porch

We arrived back in Melbourne on late on Jan. 7 and had the weekend to recover before heading back to work.  Overall it was a great trip  - maybe I will start taking relaxing vacations more often!

Sunday, January 9, 2011

More Holidays

I think I have officially forgotten than I have a job.  Being employed for 6 weeks and then having vacation for 11 days is really pretty amazing.  Sadly, I have to go back to work tomorrow so I am here to document my vacation fun before the excitement of half year reviews begins.

Grampians
Kelly, Parita, and I went to the Grampians National Park from Dec 28-30.  Parita is a fellow EY-er and was gracious enough to be our chaffeur for 3hour trip to the Halls Gap.  About 2 hours into the trip we encountered the one thing we had been worried about - locusts!! 

The Locusts
It is probably hard to tell from this picture but all those little dots are locusts.  The swarm was huge - it seemed like we couldn't see where it started and ended.  I don't think I have ever encountered locusts before and wasn't really excited about being surrounded by them during the next 3 days.  Luckily, locusts seem to want to avoid you instead of landing on you and the higher we hiked the less locusts there were.

After checking into our cabin at D'Altons in Halls Gap (I wish I had a picture!) we decided to get right to exploring the area.  Our first stop was MacKenzie Falls.  We drove to the MacKenzie Falls carpark and then had a very short hike down to MacKenzie Falls.  It was beautiful!  No matter how many waterfalls I have seen, I am still in awe by them.  We took lots of pictures, dipped our feet in the cold water, and then headed back to the car for another hike.


Me at MacKenzie Falls
Our next stop was the Reed Lookout and a leisurely hike to the Balconies.  From both of these places we had great panoramic views of the Grampians.


Arriving back in Halls Gap we were welcomed by none other than a group of kangaroos!  Kelly spotted the kangaroos as we were pulling into D'Altons and Parita stopped the car for us to snap a few pictures.  After changing and going back into town for dinner we realized that the kangaroos were also in the park in the center of town.  We saw a few kids feeding them so we decided to do the same (leaves of course, there were signs everywhere not to feed the kangaroos human food.)  Here is just one of the MANY pictures we have of the kangaroos.

The next day we ambitiously decided to do the 9.6 km Wonderland Loop hike (rated as medium to hard).  The book we got from the information center said the hike should take us from the center of town to the Venus Baths, the Wonderland Car Park and then up to the Pinnacles and then back down to Halls Gap via a different route to Halls Gap.  After hiking for some time we discovered that we were not getting to the Venus Baths.  As we started meeting people who were coming down the path, I realized that we must have taken the long path.  We were still headed for the Pinnacle but just not in the direction we were supposed to.  This meant our uphill hike was much harder than if we had gone up the other side.  We made it to the Pinnacle and the view was completely worth it!

We made it!
We found the path we should have taken on the way up and headed back to town - stopping at the Venus Baths to cool off for a bit.  Arriving in town we immediately headed for the ice cream shop - the Mango Tango Sundae definitely hit the spot!

Our final outing of the trip was a stop at the Gap Winery.  We tried several wines and then purchased a glass while sitting outside and enjoying the view.  This made me really excited for the Yarra Valley winery tour that I purchased on Scoopon (great website full of Melbourne deals)

Kelly and Parita at the Gap Winery
The rest of the trip consisted of a homemade meal of pasta, salad, and garlic bread; TV; much needed sleep; and the trip back to Melbourne. 

Wow - that blog really wore me out.  I think I better relax and watch TV in preparation for work tomorrow.  Stay tuned for the recap of Fiji soon!