The Travels of Kate

So I went down for breakfast, but there wasn't really much to be had, so Eloise decided it was a good chance to show me how to walk to Balaclava so we could pick up some breakfast there. St. Kilda has apparently become very touristy, so people who live in St. Kilda leave and go to other suburbs to do their shopping, and the closest one to us is Balaclava. It's about a ten minute walk, and it's where I can do my shopping or catch the public transport or whatever. Along the way, we passed some interesting graffiti:

When we got there, we went to one of Eloise's favorite cafes, which was quite nice. I had muesli, which is like a grainy cerealish thing. It was good.

We then went to the supermarket and picked up some stuff and made our way home.

A little bit later, my mom and Pippi came over, and the four of us went down to the uni so I could enroll. Having Eloise there was great because the uni is huge and I would have had no idea where I was going otherwise, hehe. We kept running into all of these issues, though, like my address was wrong and then they didn't like my student ID number so I couldn't set up my email, and all sorts of stuff like that, but we did finally get it sorted. I didn't take a whole lot of pictures of the uni, actually, but here are a few:

That last photo is from a special library in the student union building. It has videos and magazines, the entire Star Trek collection, and fun books like that.

As we were leaving, Eloise was getting out of her parallel parked spot and backed right into the car behind us. And the owner of the car was luckily right there about to get into his car. And Eloise sped away! So in my first 24 hours in the country I had already been to the pub and been in a car accident. A hit and run at that!

Afterwards we went back to Pippi's house and then my mom and I took a walk to Fish and Chippery. But I did not get fish and chips, I got a burger and chips. Not all too shocking, I know. I must say the chips here are quite good. I think I actually like them better than most American fries. They always seem to have lovely seasonings.

And that was pretty much my day. The end.

So I know that I've gotten terribly behind with this, though, in my defense, I didn't have internet for the first few days anyway. But here we go.

So the flight was long and bumpy. Not all too much to report on there. Oh, except for when we got on the Qantas plane in LA, I was so excited because we had those personal in flight entertainment screens on the back of the seat in front of you. You could watch TV shows or movies or play games! It was pretty awesome and it made our 14.5 hour flight slightly more bearable.

Then, while waiting in the Sydney airport to catch our flight to Melbourne, my mom and I made this awesome video:

So yeah. We arrived in Melbourne at 11:30am on Sunday the 11th. In the domestic terminal, as it was a flight from Sydney to Melbourne. And when we walked out to baggage claim and such, there was no one there to greet us! It was kind of sad. We eventually found Pippi and Phillip waiting for us in the international terminal. I guess they were confused.

We eventually got back to the Porter house, which is where I'm going to be living. I was then, of course, semi-overwhelmed by family and questions and stuff like that. I was shown my room, which is cozy. It's honestly smaller than I would have liked (probably about the size of your room, Jonathan), but it will work. There's a great view of downtown Melbourne from one of my windows, so that's cool. Let's have some pictures!

Roz's house is really neat overall. It's from the 19-teens, Edwardian period. And it's just so sprawling. Room after room after room and all these nooks and crannies. It's been described as sort of a storybook house, and I think I'd agree with that. Sometime I'll have to go through and photograph the house and just make an entry about that, because it would be quite interesting.

The Porter house is well known in our family for being quite eccentric. When I arrived, there wasn't a door on the upstairs toliet or shower. So when I got here the first day and wanted to have a shower, Eloise just told everyone to stay downstairs.

After my shower, Eloise came in and said she had a friend coming over, and would I like to go out, and I said sure, so we went. It was Eloise and Phillip (cousins), myself, and Tom (friend of Eloise.) I didn't actually ask where we were going, and they ended up taking me to a pub. It was a really nice pub though, hee, with a great view of the ocean. Phillip insisted on "starting my time here out right" and got me a beer, as I am of the legal drinking age here. I'm not really sure if I liked it...but oh well.

But it was still really gorgeous up there, so here are some pictures:

After that, Eloise, Phillip, and myself went to Pippi's house where even more of my family was gathering to greet me. Again, lots and lots of questions, hehe, but it was good to see everyone. Here is a picture of my mom and her three big sisters in Pippi's house:

After dinner, I went home to the Porter house, where Uncle David was in the front room talking with an Albanian opera singer. She apparently comes over quite a bit, usually pretty close to 11pm. She was in love with my accent (which I thought was weird, since there's so much American stuff here) and was trying to get me to say all this stuff, though I was just wanting to go to sleep, as I was jetlagged and exhausted. However, when I got to my room, I found that my cousin Michael and the Albanian opera singer's boyfriend were busy trying to put the doors on the shower and toliet, which are both right by my room. So there was lots of nice construction going on. And then the doors didn't fit the frames, so they brought out the electric saw! I've gotten to the point, though, that things like that don't phase me. I'm pretty used to coming home and there being yet another stranger in the living room or kitchen. It's just how things are here!

But anyway, yes, that was my first day!

More to come, of course.

Well, I've decided on 8 pairs that I think I can do without in Australia. This still leaves me with 12 that I really want to bring. I fear that this might be problematic.

However, I have already preformed a packing miracle by fitting all of the clothing I'll need into a single suitcase (thanks largely to the wonders of the Space Bag), so we'll see what I can do...

The fun will be beginning very soon, and I want to keep you all updated on what I'm doing. Click "Subscribe" (over on your right), to receive an email every time I update my travel journal. That way, you won't miss a thing!