Hey everyone!
Without knowing it time has been flying by. Just over two and a half months in now and I think we’re starting to think like locals..Only thing is there are no locals here in Surfers. Maybe a few, like 4. It’s touristy here, and without the constant meeting of new people at uni (most of them Swedish or Norwegian which is pretty cool) we don’t really know much about the Australian culture here yet. Laid back yes, but only because we see it on the management side, when we had a problem with one of our stove top elements not turning off they took their sweet time getting to us. At least we knew where the electricity breaker was so we could turn it off!
We started meeting more Aussies in class, but like I said before it’s mainly our crew with a few pretty awesome Scandinavian friends to chill with. When we got here the hype for being near the beach was huge, it’s so easy to get away from the hype and just take it for granted. That’s when you see how the people here live away from the beach. The nightlife is not a Friday night only, its every night if you want. Stay out till 5 am if you want. It’s funny how so many of us have gotten so turned off with the soulless “culture” here.. You have to dress up, wear pants and shoes when its 30 degrees to go out which leaves you dead no matter what you’re doing- Just not what we pictured it as with the beach lifestyle and wearing flip flops and surfing all the time. Sad.
So we’ve improvised!. We have an awesome crew here, we get out when we’re not in school and play soccer on the beach, random movie nights, bodyboard, go on “super skates” (a few of go longboarding late at night when there’s traffic’s slow and just cruise. It’s also how my first board got run over by a taxi driver when it rolled out onto the road without me seeing it... Worst! ). I’ve been out golfing a couple times, my buddy has a golf course right in his backyard so I just take the clubs and walk out to the 14th hole and play as many random holes until its dark.. Keeps it in the student budget haha. Lastly, surfing! Last time I blogged we had just gotten boards. If you can get out to the beach here by 6 am and catch the beauty sunrise the waves are usually decent otherwise they come in crashing really quick when the tide is out, its all timing. But sometimes we take an hour bus ride down to a beach called Coolangatta where they had the Quiksilver Pro and the waves there last forever and are so fun to ride! Pretty big sometimes as well. Oh, and I just had my front tooth knocked out from the awesome Coolangatta waters I was just praising.. thank-you surfboard!
Speaking of Quiksilver Pro, I’ve been able to check out some pretty cool events here. This place definitely attracts some big names. By the way Nelly and his possy were at a club here the other night and Snoop Dogg and Bowwow as well. Come here come all thugs. The surf contest was sweet, we would stand right in the water waist deep and see the pros drop in right passed us.. Unreal! ..39 year old Kelly Slater won. Nice little $425,000 cheque for top prize. Overall amazing surfing.
I met up with a mutual friend of mine who lives in Brisbane, got out for some wakeboarding down in the Tweed River had a blast behind a nice Nautique boat, blaring tunes and a bullshark filled river. No fear!
I recently got to see Nitro Circus live, check it out if you haven’t heard of it. In short, its Travis Pastrana (landed first ever double backflip on a dirtbike in competition) and his team along with local pros put a big show together and throw huge backflips over big gaps and have their bmx buds, scooter stunt crew, tricycle team, and other jumpable objects sacrifice themselves over 60 foot gaps! Dang!!
Sounds like I’ve done a lot.. and I have so far, but school has weaved itself in there to cut some of this fun off. Fortunately Easter break has arrived. We get the following week off and then Monday as well! We’ve planned a trip to Sydney for 4 days. Checking out the Opera house of course, then the zoo and bunch of other things. We just bought tickets for a pro rugby game as well. Really looking forward to it!
I think that’s all for now, its different trying to describe the lifestyle that has become, not just a short vacation, I’m still here for a while! I hope this blog finds everyone well and I miss all of you. I’ll do better to keep these blogs coming a little more frequent.
Happy Easter!
Your Canadian Friend
