Canberra-finally

Dad driving, Lake George, room

On Friday we drove to Canberra. Dad was driving and did a pretty good job. He only turned on the windshield wipers 7 times instead of the signal light. It was a nice drive even though we got stuck in traffic for about 45 minutes. We saw lots of farm land and a lake that was totally dried up. We got into Canberra after about 4 hours. And went to the National Museum which was pretty cool but we only had a couple hours and that wasn’t enough time. But, it was free so I’ll probably go back. Canberra is a little bigger than Saskatoon (320 000 people). It’s a really nice city and I have not even seen a magpie let alone been attacked by one as I was told I would. I arrived at the University of Canberra early Saturday morning to move in and I was immediately told that Arscott House (my rezzie) is “a little dodgy” so when I fill out the room inventory to write down everything that is even the tiniest bit damaged. My room isn’t too bad. The closet has no doors, a bug crawled out of my phone, and I couldn’t actually make phone calls anyway or use the internet all weekend because I had to put money on my phone account and I needed a password to use the internet (all of which we could not do on the weekend). So I’m sitting here at my laptop writing this on Word feeling seriously lonely and disconnected. But I do have a pretty big fridge in my room so it’s not all bad. Yesterday was fun. I met tons of cool people and at night we had the traditional naming ceremony where everyone has to tell an embarrassing story about themselves and the senior residents (SR’s) give you a nickname based on it. I am now Dangles and no, I will not tell you the story. Well, I’m going to head over to the mall now (it’s huge and only like a 5 min walk away); I still have to buy some stuff for my room.

Well, it’s 11pm now and I have a little time before bed. I was really homesick this morning but I’ve discovered that as long as I keep busy I’ll do okay. Today I saw a big group of wild kangaroos on campus on the way to the Hub (like Place Riel at the U of S). It was rainy all day today and I guess they hang out on campus all the time in cooler weather. It’s fantastic! Some of them are really big and dangerous, not like the little tame ones at the zoo. Apparently, if you piss them off or even get to close they will sit back on their tails and kick you with their back legs. This campus is great. Tomorrow the real orientation starts (so far its just been rezzie orientation) so I hope to be able to use the internet and phone; I’m going nuts without it.