No shared dorm rooms: Granted, I’m drawing on my limited experience at only two American universities (NCSU and CU), but in my experience, underclassmen dorms have rooms in which two people must share a sleeping space, usually with bunk beds in it. None of the rooms here at Newcastle are set up that way, not even the first-year dorms. Some of the upperclassmen dorms are set up with five separate bedrooms, each of which is the size of a dorm room in Sullivan at NCSU, that share a bathroom, kitchen and living room. They’re actually pretty nice dorms. The only shared rooms on campus are the married housing.
-----------------------------------------------------
Newcastle nights (and days): This weekend was our weekend in Newcastle and the surrounds. LJ came up on the train Friday night. We did a tour of the wine country and saw a comedian Saturday night. Sunday was spent booking plane tickets for all our upcoming travel (there’s quite a lot of it) and playing at the beach.
Trekabout Tours: We booked our wine tour through Trekabout Tours, a little company started by a married couple who have spent their lives living and working in the Hunter Valley. I really liked this outfit and highly recommend them to anyone who might take a tour of the Hunter Valley. (Sure, I know that most of you will never see Newcastle, let alone be able to find it on a map, but I know that a few locals have read my blog.) The weather wasn’t good for anything, except perhaps drinking, since it was drizzly and gray all day. (No really good pix due to the weather.) LJ and I caught a train to Maitland (about 30 min by train from Newcastle), where Steve of Trekabout Tours picked us up in the 12-passenger van (“mini-bus”, in their lingo). We picked up Trinity, a girl from Brisbane who was in the area for a wedding that evening; Greg and Rochelle, and Mona and Mel, who were both there for the John Farnham concert. *ASIDE: John Farnham is Australia’s gift to popular music, or so I’m told. I’m not exactly sure what American singer is a good comparison for popularity. I don’t know that any Americans have enjoyed the popularity that JF has. His concerts sell out in an hour, even when 20 go on sale at once. A few years back, he gave up doing big stadium shows, which has only jacked up his prices even more. This show was at a small outdoor venue for a few thousand set up in the middle of the Hunter Valley. Tickets were upwards of AUD$120 each. I’ve paid half that much to see REM and U2, but I’m not sure that I would pay that kind of money to see anyone. Anyways… these four people thought a wine tour would be a good way to spend the day before the concert. Later that day we also picked up Jon (“Yon”) and Richard, a couple guys from Amsterdam who decided that drinking was a better way to spend a rainy day than whatever else they had planned.
Since it was a small group, we could see some of the boutique wineries that can’t handle large crowds. Most of the wines from these places aren’t even sold in the bottle shops (translation: liquor stores) here in Oz, let alone overseas. During the day, we went to Serenella, Pepper Tree, Ivanhoe, Golden Grape Estate, Audrey Wilkinson, and McGuiggans. The last one is the only one that’s likely to be found overseas, since they’re a large commercial outfit. At that last stop we also got to stop in at a cheese shop and a fudge shop, both of which were magnificent. I’m glad that they’re not easily accessible to me, or I could gain ten pounds in a week. J
A note on the Golden Grape Estate: they have a NASTY concoction known as Dragon’s Breath. It’s a butterscotch schnapps with chili peppers in it. Anyone who has seen the infamous Prairie Fire shots that crop up occasionally for special occasions (a 21st birthday here, a bachelor party there) knows what this drink tastes like. It’s their best-selling drink and is being shipped all over Asia. I guess men can be stupid and macho in all countries. J
Ross Noble live: If you’ll remember back to one of my earlier updates (posted 13 February 2004), I spoke of a show called “Ross Live” and a hilarious comic who was on the show that night, Ross Noble (misspelled his name earlier). When we decided to spend the weekend in Newcastle, I found that Ross Noble was giving a show at the Civic Theater Saturday night, so I got tickets to it. My cheeks and jaw hurt from laughing so much, and I thought LJ was going to die laughing. Noble is known as the UK’s hottest comic right now, and I can understand why. I think I appreciated his humor in large part because he’s just as random as I am. Take my ability to veer wildly off topic and then make it funny (not because you’re laughing at me, but because it’s truly funny) and you’ll get some sense of what he’s like.
I can tell that I’ve started to acclimate to Australia already, because there were a number of jokes that I got that LJ didn’t, because they were based on Australian slang. One in particular that I remember was about the hash key (what we call the pound key) on the telephone. The joke definitely wouldn’t have worked with our name for that key. J I’m sure that there are things that I missed that an Aussie would get. I also appreciated the humor in a Brit making fun of the Aussies. He’s actually from Newcastle in England, so he made many references to the original Newcastle.
-----------------------------------------------------
Now that’s what I call customer service: (Monday, 8 March, afternoon) In the process of booking all the travel on Sunday and today, I became rather frustrated with the workings of the Qantas website. Turns out that I managed to make a couple of mistakes in bookings, one small one (listed LJ as Ms., not Mr.) and one large one (booked two tickets for myself, instead of for LJ and me). I was apprehensive about calling the customer service rep to discuss the problems, since it said in bold print at the bottom of the confirmation page that name changes were not allowed. My fears were for nil, though. After holding for about 10 minutes (not terribly unreasonable in any country), I spoke with Donna, who made short work of the problems. With the gender confusion, she looked at the booking and saw that it was obvious that it was in a male’s name and made a note on the form. For the name change, which is what really worried me, she just looked at it and saw that my name was written twice and asked if the second name should be Lawrence Wobker, as on the first reservation. Now, it’s important to note here that these were not for the same trip, so it wouldn’t have necessarily been obvious that his name should have been on it, but she must have paid enough attention to what I said at the beginning of the call (about how I had booked a bunch of travel) and to the first reservation and was able to make the logical deduction as to what name I meant to put as the second one. Wow, a service rep who can think for herself, and is polite and personable, too. What will they think of next? She put me on hold for a minute and went to talk to a supervisor for approval. When she came back, she told me that everything was fixed. The next time I checked my email, I had a new confirmation number for LJ’s ticket and a nice little explanation from her in the booking. I am just stunned by how easy that was. American companies could take a note from this experience.
Network is down, again: Internet was working this morning (Monday, 8 March), but it went down for two hours this afternoon. I don’t know what is wrong with this uni’s internet access, but it’s gone down more often for longer periods of time in the short time I’ve been here than CU’s network has broken in the 4.5 years that I’ve been there. The lack of internet access is all the more troubling when I’m trying to use it for research purposes, to get to code and documents on my machines back in Boulder, and not just for entertainment (like posting this blog).
Apparently I DO have to leave the country for basketball season: Those of you who follow NCSU and the ACC probably already know this, but we beat Wake Forest at home on Thursday night (4 March) 81-70. “The win, NC State's first at the Joel Coliseum in six years, left the Wolfpack (19-8, 11-5) with 11 conference victories, its most since the national title year of 1973-74.” (More at gopack.ocsn.com.) Since that season was before I was born, my superstitious side says that I have to come to Oz every year for our basketball team to do this well. Maybe I can get Herb (NC State coach) to throw some money towards it, for the sake of his job security. Hmmm….
I’ve succumbed to the mobile mania: I decided that I needed a mobile myself, since there are so many people who need to get in touch with me. (Okay, not really. I just feel lost without an ability to make calls at any time.) Luckily LJ’s friend from Cisco, Eddie, was getting a new one and is letting me borrow his old one. (A shout out to Eddie for that.) In Oz, all incoming calls to mobiles from all Australian phones (mobile or home) are free, but outgoing calls can be really expensive. The prepaid plan I got from Optus costs 37¢ per 30 seconds, an outrageously high rate. For calls from 8 pm-7 am, I can make a 10 minute call for 30¢, reverting to the high rate after 10 minutes. Texting is really big here, and I can see why, since text messages are only 25¢, international or domestic. My mobile number (for emergencies and/or text messages only) is 0431 639 441.
Cherry Ripe: n. A candy bar made by Cadbury that consists of a thin chocolate coating around crushed, sugary cherry goop, similar to a chocolate covered chery, but not drippy and juicy. A bit overly sweet, with a consistency akin to the coconut of a Mounds bar. Cherry Ripes are one of the big Aussie candy bars. I think I’ll try a new Aussie food at least every week, to get a better taste of the country. (Pun most definitely intended.)
What IS truly Australian?: (9:37 p.m. Tuesday 09 March) This is a question that I’ve been pondering for some time now. Often when someone here does or says something, I’m not sure if it’s generically Australian or only found in Newcastle, or even some peculiarity of the person. Just today at lunch, when both Gabriel and Anthony brought sandwiches on rolls instead of slices of bread, I asked if that was an Aussie thing. In thinking about this issue, I realized that it’s really hard to identify how local or national a mannerism is in the US. Someone who visits Boulder may wonder if it’s normal for tofu to be a menu choice for any sort of cuisine, just as someone visiting Raleigh might wonder if sweet tea is served with every meal, including breakfast. I guess I’ll just have to pay attention when I travel around Oz and see what other areas are like.