Author Archives: Cali4beach

Marieke and I woke up fairly early and set off to Byron Bay for our first lesson. It was pouring in the morning and I felt bad for Scott and his family who had woken up early to mulch the flower beds. I couldn’t even hug Scott goodbye (though I would see him for the Fraser trip) because he was completely soaked from the rain and dirty from the mulch.

Marieke and I followed the signs to the highway, which had a picture of manatee (or dugong as they call it here) in a triangle on the sign. I tried to get a picture of it, but we drove by too fast. We really needed to get gas and we kept passing gas stations but the gas was so expensive! So we decided we would hop on the highway and get off at the exit with the first gas station sign. However, we were driving on the highway for over 10 minutes and while we passed a lot of exits, we didn’t see any signs for gas. I was starting to get worried because the gas meter went on red and I wasn’t sure how much longer we would be able to drive for. It would be so dumb to be stuck on the highway with no gas when we could have stopped at like 5 different gas stations. So finally I told Marieke to take the next exit and we would just find gas somewhere.

Well we got off the next exit and the road led into a giant roundabout with a bunch of different roads branching off on it and no gas station in sight. Instead of driving randomly in one direction in the hopes of finding gas, we circled around, intent to get back on the highway and drive maybe to the next exit. But I told Marieke to take the wrong turn to get on the highway and we headed down a random road. It turns out this was a good thing though because a couple hundred feet up the road was a gas station! We were saved!

We filled up the tank and then sped off to Byron Bay. The drive took about 2 hours, though again due to my amazing ability to pass out while someone is driving in like .043 seconds, I was asleep for most of it (I bet you are kind of feeling sorry for Marieke now because she always have to drive by “herself”! Normally I’m a lot better at staying awake during roadtrips but not for this roadtrip!)

We got to Byron Bay and drove around a bit looking for our hostel. Byron Bay is a really cute surf town with lots of shopping opportunity and a fair amount of hippies. But, it’s nothing compared to Nimbin which I will write about a bit later!

So we finally found our hostel and checked in. We chose to share an 8 person room with girls only, because girls tend to smell a lot better than guys! We had a quick lunch, then got picked up for our surf lesson around 1:30 P.M.

We were advised through the Sharkie Travel agent at our School to book our surf lessons through Mojo surf because they had good rates and really taught a lot. For our first lesson we drove 20 minutes away from Byron Bay to Flat Rock Beach would be a high tide, with lots of good crumbly waves that the beginner surfer would want to practice on.

I had done a two week surf camp in Baja California four years ago, but I was SUPER out of practice the first day! I think I only caught like 3 waves. By the end of the lesson, I was so tired from all the times I wiped out and was rolled around in the ocean like I was in a washing machine.

When we got back to our hostel, Marieke and I had a really chill night and just talked with some other people at our hostel.

We woke up a decent hour to start our drive, but still it was early considering I was still wiped from not sleeping the other night. We ate the cornflakes we brought with us for breakfast in water glasses because we had no bowls in the room. Then we packed up our stuff and hit the road. We had to get back on the Bruce Highway (A1) and so of course we followed the signs for it. Turns out though, the signs took us in huge loop around Rockhampton in which A1 was only a few streets up from where we first started. I really don’t get why they made it like that because it was a waste of 20 minutes fighting through traffic to get to the practically the same place.

I should probably explain what the highways are like here. It’s not at all the interstates in the States where you have nice medians separating the opposite directions of traffic. For the most part, from Townsville and Brisbane the road is a two lane highway, one lane each way, with only a double white line separating the lanes. It gets really tiring driving on these roads because while there are occasionally an extra lane to pass, sometimes it’s only the two lanes with dotted lines allowing you to pass. However, since Marieke’s car is so low power, if we were stuck behind a slow car or truck we were stuck there for a looong time; her car wouldn’t be able to speed up fast enough to cut into the other lane and get back to ours before a car would pass us.

In fact, head on collisions is often a problem on these highways. About every kilometer or two, there’s signs to “take a break mate, you’re eyes are shot,” or “collision zone, next 25 km.” It can be kind of intimidating sometimes when you’re driving, especially at night and a huge truck with bright lights looks like it’s barreling towards you from the other lane.

Another thing you have to look out for is Kangaroo and Koalas crossing the road. About half of cars that drive on the roads here have roo-bars, which are bars attached to the hood of the car so that if you hit a kangaroo, it will bounce off the car instead of hitting the windshield. Running over a Kangaroo on the highway is as common as hitting a deer in the U.S. Actually, the first wild kangaroo I saw in Australia was not a happy, bouncing Kangaroo like I thought it would be, but roadkill.

This is why it takes a lot of concentration to drive on roads in Australia. Marieke and I were constantly saying “please don’t let us hit a kangaroo” because not only would it be traumatizing, but also her car doesn’t have a roo-bar and hitting one would probably total it. However, we were lucky throughout the trip and while we saw a lot of roadkill and dead kangaroos, we didn’t hit anything ourselves.

About halfway through our drive from Rockhampton to Brisbane there was a sign for Hervey (pronounced like Harvey; I don’t why understand Australians pronounce things like they do sometimes) Bay Tourist Drive. Since we were going to Hervey Bay later in our trip, Marieke and I thought it’d be cool to check it out. The drive really took us out of the way, added an extra hour to our journey, but we had a nice break from driving by walking on the beach. The beach was similar to sandflats and there was practically nobody on it. I love when I have the beach to myself so it was very nice. ?

Then once we left Hervey Bay, I texted my friend Scott who we were supposed to stay with in Brisbane that we were a few hours away. Then I got a strange message back from him about whether we would want to hang out tonight or just meet up tomorrow. I told him I thought we were staying with him and he said, “yeah, right. No worries, come on down.”

So we drove a few more hours then texted Scott that we were about two hours away and he said he was going to the movies but we could meet him at his house after that. Because we were tired and didn’t feel like sitting around doing nothing while he was at the movie, Marieke and I decided it would be easier on all of us for we stayed in a hostel in the city. Coming into Brisbane, we finally had nice roads with multiple lanes and a median.

However, we spent over an hour driving around, searching for our hostel! Even though we had a map, it was from the Lonely Planet Travel guide book and wasn’t that helpful. I think we asked five different people on the streets to help us find it, and at one point her car almost couldn’t make it up a steep hill and we almost rolled down into traffic. :/

Finally we found it, checked in and shared a room with an Irish-American guy and his Irish friend. It was funny talking to the Irish American guy because one minute he sounded completely American and then the next he sounded completely Irish. They were nice enough, but the room smelled like sweaty feet because they hadn’t done laundry in two weeks and had been wearing the same socks for a few days!! Ew.

I got to talk to Scott after his movie let out (apparently he thought we were coming a lot later that night?) and we made plans to meet up the next day to go to the Australian Zoo. Then Marieke and I passed out again.

Just got back to Towsville after my long lecture recess break. It was awesome, will post more about it soon.

So tired from our ten hour drive from rockhampton to here. It wasn’t too bad with my friends Kristen and Marieke also driving Marieke’s car.

Still, I’m soooo tired. And I must wake up early tomorrow to go to class.

Tomorrow I head off with my roommate Marieke and a plethora of other German Studyabroad students to Airlie Beach to go on a two day sailing trip around the whitsundays!

I am very excited about this, as everyone I’ve talked to said the whitsundays are incredibly beautiful.

Too bad I have a lot of work to do now and until Lecture recess (only 14 days, including my whitsunday trip, to write 3 big papers!!!!) so I’m not sure how relaxing this vacation will be.

I find it ironic I am stressed about a vacation. It also feels surreal that tomorrow I will be on a bus to Airlie beach. I packed a bit earlier because if I wait to the last minute, I forget things like PJS, shampoo, or my favorite, the toothbrush.

Right now I am at the school computer lab, looking for as many articles/books about for my english paper in the hopes of possibly brainstorming a bit on my trip. We’ll see how that goes!!

Tonight is also Uni Club night, which means there is a ridiculous amount of drunk people running around on campus and peeing on trees. Unfortunately a bunch of them just came to meet their girlfriends who are studying in here, so I think this is a good incentive to head home; I’m tired as well.

Tomorrow, I also turn in my first draft for my writing class. Hope my teacher likes it!  She’s very subjective, so I don’t know if she’ll like my “horror” piece, slightly inspired the movies I’ve seen in my horror cinema class.

ps. Never watch “Dance of the Dead” unless you want to have weird nightmares of Zombies dancing when prodded with electric cattle rods. :/ (Don’t worry Mom, I’m not traumatized for life!!)

Adios, hasta la vista.

For my Literature class, we had to read “Chinese Cinderella: The Secret Story of an Unwanted Daughter” by Adeline Yen Mah.
It’s a children’s story based off Mah’s book for adults “Falling Leaves” which is about Mah’s childhood in China during and after the WWII as the fifth child in her family. She was called “Wu Mei” which means fifth daughter.
Wu Mei’s mother died giving birth to her, so Wu-Mei is raised in a household where her full brothers and sister despise her for “killing” their mother and where the Step-Mom hates her step-children. The Step Mom particularly hates Wu-Mei because she does not try to suck up to the Step Mom like Wu Mei’s older sister does. Wu Mei’s father gives into all of his new wife demands, so the Wu-Mei is almost always treated as if she is worthless. The only people who really care about her in the story is her Nei Nei (Gma) who dies early on, her YeYe (Gpa) and her Aunt Baba.

Unfortunately, YeYe and Aunt Baba have practically no power in the household ruled by the Step Mom, so Wu Mei has to deal with her siblings and Step Mom constantly berating her. As a result, Wu Mei turns to school and achieving well there so that her father can be proud of her for once. Despite her numerous academic achievements, her family claims she shows off too much by winning awards; only the Aunt really seems to care about Wu Mei’s good grades.

Halfway through the book, some of Wu Mei’s friends show up at her house to celebrate Wu Mei’s election as class president. However, she is not allowed to have friends over and as a result, her parents flip out, declare she brings “shame” to the family and shuttle her off to boarding schools far away from her friends and family.

Throughout the next four years Wu Mei is trapped at different boarding schools, made fun of for having clothes that don’t fit because her parents won’t give her extra money, all her letters to her aunt and gpa are never delivered and she never receives mail from her family. Her father doesn’t even remember what her legal first names are (Adeline Jun-Ling) or her birthday. Wu Mei herself doesn’t even know her exact birthday because the family deemed only the Step Mother’s children will celebrate their birthday.

I won’t ruin the ending of this book which was kind of bittersweet and instead I will focus on why I am writing this blog post today.

The whole time I was reading this book, I kept feeling incredulous of how much of a “Witch” the Step-mom is and how awful Wu Mei’s family is to her.

For example, one of the things the Step Mom says to Wu Mei is,
“Not only are you are liar and a thief but you are manipulative as well. Nothing will ever come of you. The problem is that you have bad blood from your mother. You don’t deserve to be housed and fed here. Girls like you should be sent away. You don’t belong in this house!”

I can’t even imagine how it would feel as a 10 year old to have your “parent” tell you these things.

Other things happen in the book similar to this where this little girl is treated worse the family dog that not only ripped open her arm, but also killed her only pet, a duck she called “Precious Little Thing.” In fact, at one point the girl said she wished she was the family dog!

When I was reading this, at the end of almost every chapter, I kept thinking how lucky I am to have the awesome, loving parents I have and my sisters who, though we fought a ton when we were younger, were never cruel to me and loved me too.

My heart goes out to this little girl who struggled so much during her childhood to find acceptance from her parents and never really got it.

This books really makes me think a lot about emotionally/physically abusive families and how much children suffer. It makes me want to do something to stop this, because every child deserves to have a family that loves and cares about them. Nobody deserves to be treated like a “worthless”!

I know that what happened in this book was 60 years ago, but still there are children out there with really horrible families, and these children deserve a better life.

So I will end this post with part of Mah’s preface to the book, which is dedicated to those “who were neglected and unloved as children”:
“Mother Teresa once said that ‘loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted are the greatest poverty’. To this I will add: ‘Please believe that one single positive dream is more important than a thousand negative realities.’”

Ps. I also really want to read the adult version of the novel and see how it compares to the children novel because I’m sure there would be more detailed/complex issues brought into play.