Arcadia Orientation: St. Kilda, Sorrento, Melbourne

After about 20 hours of pain-free airtime (believe it or not) we finally made it to Australia! The flights really could not have gone any more smoothly. We kept ourselves busy by either watching movies or sleeping for the most part and arrived at the Melbourne airport around 8 am on Wednesday our time (so about 6 in the evening back home)... we actually skipped Tuesday all together. We were greeted be the awesome Arcadia staff. They are associated with Arcadia University in PA but are from Sydney and were there to help us transition to life in Australia... or "straya" as the Aussies pronounce it. 

On the way to the orientation guesthouse in Sorrento, we stopped in St. Kilda for a couple hours for lunch and to look around. We got our first taste of culture shock while eating lunch. The prices are a bit expensive, however tax is included in everything and you are not supposed to tip because minimum wage is about $20 (AUD). The orientation leaders explained that because waiters are paid well and don't depend on tips, they are not as motivated to give the best service. Our waitress was just fine, although she did look at our friend Lindsey as if she had two heads when she asked for a "regular" coffee. After lunch we walked to the pier to find some penguins (yes, there was even a sign that said they lived there... We thought our orientation leader was pulling our leg) but we didn't have any luck.

St. Kilda

We boarded the bus around 2-ish and headed to Sorrento. When we arrived, we got settled in our cute little rooms, had a couple of meetings, had a delicious dinner, had a final meeting, and finally I was ready to go to sleep at 8:30. Unfortunately, the next morning I was wide awake by 4:30. Jet lag is not so fun. Anyways, we had a few more short meetings about what we are expecting to get out of this experience, financial issues, and housing; then we were able to go out to the town for lunch and go see the beach. One of the orientation leaders described the beach as "not your average little manicured beach but rather raw, rugged beauty" (of course this was all in her cute Australian accent :) This place was incredible! I could not stop taking pictures and the pictures I captured do no justice whatsoever. It was truly amazing. Finally we had another really awesome dinner, some free time, and then later in the evening, we learned some traditional Aussie dances and listened to music from the Bushwazzie Band-- I unfortunately still cannot get one of the songs out of my head... "G'day g'day! How ya goin'?".... And alas even though I had planned to stay up to try and get over the jet lag, I just could not keep my eyes open and fell asleep around 9. 

Sorrento

The next morning (Friday) I slept all the way to 6:30. We had breakfast and one quick meeting before packing up our things and taking off to see some wild kangaroos. Seeing the roos was an awesome experience. There were so many of them! Also, the landscape was so beautiful. I went off on my own to get some good pictures (surprised?) and I got so close to one! I had to be within a meter or two! (Trying to switch to metric because that's what they do here) Sterling and I spoke about the magnificence of the entire area-- one second we were on a beautiful beach, next in the wild aussie bush, and the next we reached the happening city of Melbourne. We went on a walking tour with the orientation people, and then set off to explore the city. We had some lunch on Federation Square, went back to the hotel to check in, then explored the city for a while. We found an internet cafe, where I sat down to message home. Then we were back in the hotel where some of the students had a penthouse room (two stories and all) and we hung out there for a while. We went to Chinatown for dinner, at a place called Ants Bistro. Then we met up with John Hill from Gettysburg at the Turf Club, where they held an Australian themed party! It was great to see him and meet some of the friends he had made while preparing for school at the Uni in Melbourne. It turned out that some of the students on orientation with us knew some of his friends, and they came back to the hotel to see each other! The whole experience in the city was amazing, and we went to sleep that night-- ready to head off to Sydney, and eventually Wollongong, to finally reach our place.

Melbourne

View from the penthouse