Week 3 at the uni...

After looking over our blogs, I realized that not only have I not posted for awhile, but I also haven't talked much about school- so here it goes. I am enrolled in two classes, which is the full-time load for the masters program, and sitting in on another class. Of the two classes that are a part of my program, one has only two students (including myself) and the other has seven students, so I am getting a very personalized education. The smaller class, Bioethics, Public Policy, and the Law, is taught using the Socratic method, which is pretty intense with only two of us and with a topic that I don't know much about. The class and readings are very challenging, but also interesting, so I'm really enjoying it. My other class is Questions of Life and Death, and focuses on the wrongness of killing. Although it is clear that killing is wrong, it is not clear how do define the wrongness of killing using morally significant reasons in a way that permits one to kill plants and animals for food, but that also allows or disallows (depending on the argument) for killing during abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia. The last class, that I'm just sitting in on, is an undergraduate honors philosophy class; being a part of the philosophy department might just be the biggest learning stretch for me. It is a value theory class (not sure what that means) that focuses on a population question. Over the course of the semester, we will try to answer one question- is there a moral right to bring a happy child into the world (versus not having a child at all). I initially sat in on this class because the school wasn't sure if my public policy class would continue with such a low enrollment, so this was a possible alternative. The public policy class will continue, but I figure I'll stick with the philosophy class because it's interesting and is related to my degree. All of my classes are seminar-style classes, so they meet once a week for two hours each. One thing that I've found interesting, and quite enjoyable, is that about an hour into the class, we take a tea break. Everybody walks down the hall to the lounge, where we make tea, or in my case, coffee, and eat biscuits. We spend about 10-15 minutes visiting over our drinks, and then we go back to the classroom for the final hour of class. Not only does it give us a chance to refresh, but it gives us a chance to get to know each other without disrupting class.

View from the top

This is the view from our balcony on the 23rd floor. The beer is worth about $2.50. And yes, that is a Cuban cigar I am holding!

Dial-up is excruciatingly slow. The idiots at the telephone company screwed up the order so no DSL line yet but due to some heavy complaining on my end we have temporary dial up service. I don't know if any of you remember how painstakingly slow dial up was when the internet was a few pics and mostly text, but now that every page has some type of flash or video... dial up is ridiculous. the point is, we now have internet available at the apartment and will be connected most of the time. So, all you have to do is call Nikki or I's cell phone and we'll get it. Just keep in mind we are 17 hours ahead.

One more thing, I made a small error in the size of the city in my last post. Melbourne is 4 million people not 11 million. From my angle though it is a helluva lot of people.

Aussies are hellions!

I thought my class in Fife sometimes was a pain in the arse (Nikki is using Australian words in her posts so I thought I should in mine). I spent my first two days in the classroom at Lalor Secondary College. They wanted to hire me straight out. Evidently PE teachers are a hard find here. So, they asked if I could come out and sub for a few days and get a feel of the school. By the way, the call it CRT work, or Casual Relief teaching. So, I went out there Monday and Tuesday. The teachers were very friendly and the schedule is friggin' sweet! The only catch is the kids. I tried teaching them some skills in Soccer. Which is not exactly my best sport. Just to get the little bastards to line up in 5 even lines took ten minutes. They were very respectful, and listened when told to do something, but it was like a class of 20 ADD kids. Evidently the school is a low socio-economic, highly cultural diverse area, which as mean as it sounds to put in print usually equates into the rougher kids. So, I don't think I'm gonna jump on that position. I'll hold out for something better. I'm hoping it was just these kids and not Australians as a whole as I've already committed to the Adass Israel School. That's right a private Jewish school. I'm really expanding my horizons. Beyond that job I have offers for tutoring work and plenty of CRT work.

After some mild grumbling between Nikki and I that we flew to other side of the globe to find Canada, the cool little differences are starting to show up. For example, school in OZ has 2 periods... then recess (30 minutes)... 2 periods... then lunch(60 minutes).... then 2 periods. The teacher has a total of 22, 45 minute periods with the student contact. That is 16 hours of teaching a week... not bad! Still no toilets with definite evidence on the direction of the flush. That one is killing me. I can go buy a Cuban Cigar any time I like and I have in fact.


On the home front, our place is so cool. I can't say it enough. I have to walk out on the balcony every time I walk by, it is quite a view. We do have furniture now it's like IKEA took a crap in the place, but it was cheap and is magnificent after 2 weeks in a hotel room with no bathroom. I tell you what though. I have no idea how anyone can live without a TV. I'm going crazy here. Back in the states I was usually so busy I was lucky to get an hour in front of the tube, and it really didn't matter what I watched. It's just that beatiful feeling of blissful rest when you can switch off your brain and watch the good old boob tube. I've been working on the TV but it is tough when you are due for a nice TV but you only get it for a year. Funny enough Nikki was the one clamoring for a big TV this weekend and I said no we probably shouldn't. what an idiot I am. Anyway, the internet is due to be turned on in Thursday the 24th. So, my phone number will once again get you in touch with me (not just the voicemail) and I plan to spend a lot of time on the phone calling dear friends.

talk to y' all soon.

-Mark

Getting settled in...

We moved into our apartment last Wednesday, and have spent much of the time since getting settled in. The place didn't come with any furniture, so we bought an air mattress to sleep on the first couple of nights (now we have a bed for visitors). When I got home from school Thursday, we went to Ikea for furniture. I have a whole new appreciation for Ikea's cheap, small furniture! We bought a bed, mattress, couch, table and chairs, pots and pans, silverware, wine and beer glasses, basically all of the essentials. It took us nearly 2 hours to shop for everything, so by the time we got to the checkout, the store was about 15 minutes from closing. Normally this wouldn't be a major issue, but of course, it turned into one. First, it did take awhile to ring everything up. Then, our credit card was denied. Now, I know we were making a large purchase in a foreign country, but we had the forsight of this and took the time to call the credit card company to let them know that we'd be here for a year and probably making some large purchases. We tried swiping the card a few times, only to have it denied. At this point the people behind us in line were looking kind of ansy. We put the order on hold so we could call our credit card company. Mark found the payphone, but for some reason couldn't make the call. Not wanting to wait another day for a bed and couch, we stepped back in line and used our debit card. To avoid being denied, since we didn't notify our bank about being here, we split the order in half and paid for each separately. Success! At this point the store was closing, but we still had to make arrangements for delivery. We filled out the delivery request and took it to the counter. There was an additional charge for delivery, but since it was a small charge, we decided to try our credit card again. Denied. No worries, we had our debit card. We ran the debit card, only this time it was also denied. Fortunately we have another bank and debit card, so we ran that one through and it worked. Nothing like following up a long, stressful evening with an hour long bus and train ride back to an apartment with no place to sit and an air mattress to sleep on. Twelve hours later, our frustrations turned to excitement as we got the call that the delivery truck was at our building. We rang them in and went down to help load the furniture into the lift (once again a new appreciation for small furniture). We got everything into the apartment and decided to hold off puting it all together because we needed to go shopping for appliances (the crazy thing is that most of the apartments here don't come with refrigerators). We walked down to a pawn shop, but didn't really find anything we liked and they didn't deliver. So we hopped on the bus to a large appliance strip mall. The first store that we stopped in had nice appliances, good prices, and a friendly salesman that said he'd be able to give us and even better deal since we were buying so much. Of course, it's not in our nature to buy from the first store we check, so we proceeded to 5-6 other stores before returning to the first store. We picked out a refrigerator, microwave, washing machine, and vacuum. Then we went to the telly section. By this point, my concept of money had been thrown out the window. We'd already spent a few thousand on our deposit, rent, and furniture, so what was another thousand right?! So, instead of looking at a small telly that would do the job, we were looking at a 42" flat panel with a great picture. It was only a few hundred dollars more than the 32" and it would look great in the apartment (or anywhere really). After seriously considering it, we were hit with a dose of reality that we would have to sell it or ship it a year later, and either way we'd lose a lot of money. Reluctantly, we bought the other appliances and left the store with a glimmer of what might have been. Then we headed back to the apartment, put together our furniture, carefully following Ikea's picture instructions (would it be that hard to put even a few words?), and sat on our couch (cheap, but uncomfortable) only to stare ahead at the empty spot where a 42" flat panel would fit perfectly. The next morning our appliances were delivered, so we went to the market to buy food for our refrigerator. The Queen Victoria market is huge! We went from booth to booth picking out fresh fruits, vegis, and herbs, and then went inside to the meats. It was like Mark's dream come true to see the beef prices; a kilo of t-bone steaks cost more than a kilo of chicken. By the way, buying food by the kilo is a little hard to get used to. We had enough food for a few nights of meals, but still had to go to Safeway to buy some of the things that they don't sell at the market. So, here we are, a bed to sleep on, a couch to sit on, a washing machine to wash our clothes, and a fridge full of food- life is good!

Couple of quick notes I forgot...

I
The verdict is still out on the toilets. They're like the European toilets. They have a push button flusher on the top and they just whooooosh out all at once (works great after a night of Bangladeshi food).




The urinals are pretty sweet though. They remind me of old Montana bars.

















The only complaint I have about the country so far is the cost of beer. It hurts my heart to see Miller Chill at $17 a six pack. What's worst is even the cheapest domestic costs $12 for a six pack. And no... noone here drinks Foster's. I haven't even seen a can of it.

Mark's turn!

Alright... so far so good. Nikki has been the big blogger on this but I plan to chime in from time to time. I've actually worried more about getting a job and finding a place to live than this blog. Good for Nikki though because this is important both for communication now for our memories later.

Melbourne is a great town. Everything we were looking to experience. Big buildings, 11 million people, cool restauraunts, everything at your doorstep. As a matter of fact we have had at least 10 different ethnicities of food (I think that is how you'd say it). Bangladeshi food is magnificent!!! Federation Square is a great hangout. We've spent a lot of time down there for the free internet. Here's a link: http://www.federationsquare.com.au/ Very cool place!

As Nikki said in another post, we have a 23rd/24th floor apartment (they call it the 23rd floor but it's actually the 24th). I am actually sitting in our hotel killing off some time right now because we can't get in until 4:30. Kind've nervous about the place. I saw so many apartments they all just kind've blended into one. All I remember about the place was that had a great view... beyond that I don't remember. Being the detail oriented person (sarcasm) that I am, I failed to remember whether it has laundry or a fridge when we were deciding on which places to stay... turns out it has neither. Oh well, screw it, it is a high rise in the middle of an 11 million person town.

Kangaroos finally...

Since we found a place to stay and have a little bit of time before school starts, we decided to spend the weekend as tourists. On Friday we went to the Game On exhibit, which focused on the gaming industry, at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image. And on Saturday we headed out of town to the Healesville Sanctuary to see kangaroos, koalas, wallabies, wombats, dingoes, platypuses, and a lot of other strange native animals. (Can you guess which one of us picked Game On and which picked the Healesville Sanctuary?) I must say that while we were both excited to see kangaroos, most of the other animals were way cooler. My personal favorites were the baby platypuses swimming through the tank :)

From hotel to hostel to hotel to home...

While I was busy at orientation, Mark was traveling all around town dropping off rental applications to the various real estate offices. Of the apartments that we applied for, only two were available immediately, so we knew we'd probably be spending even more time at the hotel. Since we were paying $80/night, which isn't bad for Melbourne, but definitely adds up, we decided to try to find a more reasonable accommodation. While searching the internet, I came across a hostel with private rooms and a discounted weekly rate. We decided to give it a try because it would save us about $200/week.

Mark moved all of our luggage across town and got us settled in. I met up with him after orientation and we ate dinner at the little pub on the ground floor that offered $6 dinners to those staying there. After dinner we went up to the room, which was small, simple, and not nearly as nice as our hotel room, but the price was right (or so I thought). We pushed the two twin beds together and started getting ready for bed; it began with the jammed hot water faucet and went downhill from there. First I slammed my hand into the edge of the sink trying to turn the handle of the hot water faucet so I could wash my face. Then neither of us could turn it back enough to get the water to stop, so it dripped all night long. If the running water wasn't enough to keep me up all night, the opening and closing of the doors, which echoed in the hallways, was. By the time the alarm went off, I had slept maybe a total of 4-5 hours, which, those that know me well know, isn't enough. Needless to say, it wasn't worth the price we were paying, and I told Mark that I wouldn't spend another night there. So, while I was at day two of orientation, Mark moved our stuff back across town to the hotel that we had just left.

The good news is that in the midst of all of this, we received quite a few phone calls letting us know that our applications for apartments had been accepted. One of the apartments was a 1-bedroom in a new building with a great location and amenities, but didn't include a refrigerator and, at $350/week, was at the top of our price range. Although we could move in immediately, we decided to turn down the offer in hopes of being accepted for the large studio at a building nearby with a better view and a price of $220/week. Unfortunately we were turned down for the studio and another nearby 1-bedroom apartment at $280/week, but we were accepted for a 1-bedroom in the heart of the city for $320/week. We decided to take it, but we can't move in until next Wednesday, so we have to pay for another week at the hotel. Though from what Mark says, it'll be worth it. (See, the crazy thing is that I've never seen the place; it was on Mark's list of apartments to inspect, not mine. The pictures seem nice and it's in a great location with awesome views, so I'm sure I'll like it. The only thing I'm hesitant about is that I'm a little afraid of heights and it's on the 23rd floor, which is actually 24 floors up because Australians call the first floor the ground floor. Maybe I won't enjoy the awesome views after all!)

Orientation pt. 2...

One of the topics that came up during today's orientation session was the meaning of orientation. I don't know if any of you have seen this or not, but here is a link to a world map oriented with Australia at the top that shows the importance of perspective on orientation. http://flourish.org/upsidedownmap/

Orientation...

Today was my first day of orientation at the Uni. Within the first 5 minutes, it was clear that this is not a dry campus. Next Tuesday, all students are invited to attend the re-launch party of the campus bar. The president of the student association is also a member of the Brewing Society of Monash (as in beer brewing). And most, if not all, of the speakers mentioned something about bars or drinking. Aside from learning about partying, orientation offered the chance to sit in on a practice lecture and practice tutorial. The practice lecture focused on the history of terrorism, which I found to be quite interesting and even a bit embarrassing when the lecturer mentioned that terrorism has increased by 660% since Bush's War on Terrorism. The practice tutorial, or tut as they call it, presented a new way of learning outside of a lecture. It is set up as a small group discussion to supplement the lecture with additional information and exploration. As a graduate student, my courses are actually seminar style, which means they are a combination of lecture and tut in one.

Happy 4th of July...

Tonight we celebrated the 4th of July with a large group of American expats at TGIFriday. The restaurant had a couple large American flags hanging and offered free face painting to kids (do any Americans celebrate the 4th with face painting?). We had a great time talking to everybody about what brought them to Australia and the differences between Australia and America. We also got good advice on finding apartments here. The process is quite a bit different than in the States. For one, the apartment must be inspected, which is similar to an open house, before an application can be lodged (Australian for submitted). Different agencies publish the times and locations of the inspections, which last only 15 minutes. The application can be picked up at the inspection and then dropped off back at the agency. The sooner the application is dropped off, the better the chances of getting the apartment. Another way to improve the chances off getting the apartment is to offer more money or to offer to pay up to 6 months in advance. I can't imagine paying more than the advertised rent, but with such fierce competition, this is something we're definitely going to need to consider.

Keep to the left...

One of the things that we've noticed walking down the streets is that we move off to the right side of the sidewalk when people are approaching and they move to the left side, which means that we almost run into each other. We figured this is probably due to the fact that we drive on the right side of the road, while they drive on the left. It's small things like this that remind us that we are in a foreign country.

We finally made it...

After a couple of long days of travel, we finally arrived in Melbourne. Aside from the drivers sitting on the wrong side of the cars, and the cars being driven on the wrong side of the roads, it actually feels a lot like Canada. Maybe this is a blessing in disguise, because then we don't feel so far away from home. We checked into our hotel, took much needed showers, and then set out to find a place to live. The main downtown area of Melbourne is really well laid out and easy to navigate, which was helpful when trying to find the rentals that were open for inspection (similar to an open house). We looked at 5 apartments today, both studios and 1 bedrooms, that ranged from about $250-$350 per week. One of the largest (and most expensive) that we looked at was probably about the size of our living room at home, so it is definitely going to be an adjustment! Tomorrow we plan on learning the bus, tram, and train system to find my school and to look at apartments outside of the main downtown area, since they are a little cheaper, and hopefully a little larger.