Join the Navy

James got new uniforms and I took it upon myself to put them on.

My favourite part is my flower in my hair. I think that should be standard issue with the attire.

Video Chatting

A few of you have had the pleasure of video chatting with me while I have been here. I have recently been playing with the features of my webcam. There is a feature where I can make myself look like a golden retriever, or like I am drawn with chalk, or greatly distorted. There is also a feature where I can draw on my video. I made the mistake of making myself into a poorly drawn mickey mouse pirate while talking to Miss Kim Bonney. She cleverly captured this with a screen capture.

Touche Miss Bonney, Touche

.

I am only sharing this with you all now, because she has already posted this on Facebook, so there is nowhere to hide now. I shall be more wary of her mischevous ways in the future.......

Differences

Being in Australia for an extended period of time has made me keenly aware of the differences in culture and people here as compared to home. Sydney is a strange paradox for me because sometimes I forget I am in another country, and sometimes I feel like an alien here. The differences are innumerable and at the same time few. Most are so slight that you wouldn't notice at first, and some are glaring. Most of the differences I can live with, but there are a few which I don't think I will ever get used to. I have compiled two separate short lists of the most entertaining/important.

Differences that make no difference:

1. The slang.

This is difficult to master because they use a great deal of slang, however, I find myself more and more inadvertently using it daily. A few examples are:

-G'day!

-Ooooh, I am keen to see that movie.

-That is brilliant, cheers.

-Hey, hey, how you going?

2. Time.

Americans value time and timeliness, some more than others, but I digress. Australians are a little more lax about time. I used to think this was just a James thing, he would say, "Hey honey, I am at the food shops I will call you back in 10 minutes." Me being an American I would honestly expect 10 minutes.....30 minutes later he would finally call. I used to joke with him, "So, 10 minutes in James time or real people time." I am coming to realize that this is not just a James thing, this is more of a typical Australian thing. A perfect example of this is that they schedule classes back to back. I had a course last night from 5-7 in one building and other course from 7-9 in a completely different building. To me this is stressful as I want to be exactly on time and I liked having classes scheduled with a ten minute break for transition between., that way I would know exactly how much time I had to accomplish things between classes and get there on time. However, there just seems to be an understanding with the Aussies, that 5-7 and 7-9 means that you start about 5ish end about 7ish, repeat for subsequent courses. So times here are close but not exact and not as important as in America.

3. Informality

I have been told that Aussies are traditionally more informal than other cultures. I find this a bit humorous because they have expansive vocabularies and speak in very formal educated forms, (with some slang thrown in.) However, the way they act towards each other is quite informal. All of my professors have earned at least one Ph.D. and have published many books. They are all definitely considered experts in their fields, however, they do not expect or want you to address them formally. I have composed a few emails to them with Dear Dr. _____ and they always respond and sign with their first name (i.e. Hi Lacey -Jeff.)

4. Food

This one is slight, they have very similar dishes to America, James claims it to be more surf and turf, I think that is debatable, but once again, I digress. The differences are small, such as milk has a slightly different aftertaste, or beef tastes different, not bad different or good different, just different.

5.Tipping

Well actually the difference is that tipping does not exist. Waitresses and workers here get paid a substantial salary and tipping is not expected or part of the culture. I can definitely get used to not tipping, the price on the menu is the price I pay.

Things I will never get used to:

6. Coffee

As I have already told many of you, on my first morning here when I was fully jet lagged I asked the waitress at breakfast for a 'normal cup of coffee.' She looked at me and responded curiously, "You mean with froth on it?" Australians are very Italian about their coffee, it is all espressos and cappuccinos. I don't mind the occasional cup of fancy coffee, they are quite nice, but there is no substitute for my morning black coffee. I have successfully rebelled and purchased my very own automatic coffee pot.

6. Short Shorts

I know many females in the U.S. are very guilty of short shorts, but I am not talking females here, I am talking about males. It is almost guaranteed that if I see a male with shorts below his knees that he is American. Their big bad tough rugby players are very guilty of this indeed. If you want a good example you can see an image at: http://www.byronimages.net/storage/albums/NRL%20Photos/2008%20Rd04%20Manly%20v%20Souths/Players/2008_Rd04-6390_sm.jpg

I was kidding James about this the other day and he said something to the effect of, "When you go for a run, you don't want a bunch of heavy material interfering." That is not a direct quote but it was something similar. I am just not sure if I will ever quite become accustomed to short shorts on burly men...

Well it is tomorrow for me and that means that I have class today. I hope you are having a wonderful yesterday.

Today in the World of Tomorrow

Well, it is not even 11AM and thus far the world of tomorrow has been an eventful day.

1. I took a shower without my glasses on and did not realize until it was close enough to be seen by my impaired eyes (about a foot from my face,) that a big spider was enjoying my shower with me. I proceeded to freak out as any arachnophobe would and try to kill the spider and stay out of the bodys way as it made it down to the drain. The only problem with that was that I could not see the body go down the drain as I was not wearing my glasses, so I had to proceed to rinse my conditioner out of my hair while standing outside of the shower...no spider is touching these toes, no sir.

2. I have read about 80 pages for tonights classes. I think that my eyes are going to fall out. I also think I have ADD, because after a page or so I always manage to find something shiny to play with. Or in the instance of now, find something else to do (i.e. blog.)

3. When reading the news today, the headline on CNN.com was "Hundreds Still Missing After 83 Inches of Rain." Typhoon Morakot, ravaged Taiwan, destroying much of the land and raining up to 83 inches of rain in some spots. To me this is just unfathomable. That means it rained as much water as Yao Ming is tall in some places! My heart goes out to the people of Taiwan.

Well, that is all I have time for as of now in tomorrow. I hope you are having a nice, and maybe less eventful yesterday, than I am having of a tomorrow.

What?! My Name is... What?! My Name is ...

..Chicka Chicka Slim Lacey!

I am aware that I do not have the most common of names, however, I have never had so many strange reactions to my name or difficulty of having people say my name correctly.

In the states I have mainly had trouble in the Starbucks line, where they ask you for your name so they can write it on your cup. Every time I would visit the Starbucks I would become someone new, sometimes I would even become a rapper. Here are a few of my favourites:

-Lassie

-Lizzy

-Lasi

-Laccee

-Leecy

-Lazy

and my all time favourite was...

-Lay-z

However, these Starbucks misspellings and pronunciations are failing to compare to the trouble I have had telling people my name here. Most people think I am saying my name is Lucy, as that is a common name here. Also, most people want to spell my name Lecey. I even recently was asked, "Lacey? That is nice name is that short for Stacey?" Apparently my two syllable name is short for another two syllable name...

I have taken this approach to introducing myself, but it has not had too productive of an effect:

Me-Hi, my name is Lacey.

(This is where they will look at me slightly puzzled trying to figure it out.)

Them-Oh, Lucy, it is nice to meet you.

Me-No, not Lucy, Lacey, like the material.

(They again look at me with a ponderous expression.)

Me-Lacey, like the stuff you make curtains out of, or doilies...

Most of the time this will suffice, but I am considering two options to help in this situation.

1. Always wear lace, so that I can point to the material.

2. Or if I don't always want to look like a little girls doll, I will just carry a sample with me at all times.

I suppose I could consider a third, and just change my name to Sheila.

Row, Row, Row

Your boat gently, down the sea. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily a pirate's life for me. I went sailing with a few friends on Sydney Harbour. Thankfully, there was no reason for us to need to row, therefore, our sail was successful. Also, just as thankfully, we did not encounter any pirates during our travels. It would have been good to practice my anti-piracy skills, but I will save that for another day. We did indeed encounter some very beautiful scenery.

I suppose we aren't too bad either. We started from a little harbour and sailed for about 2-3 hours. We went past James' navy base (and I took a picture for him since he was absent.) We passed the Opera House, and then even under the Sydney Harbour Bridge!

Overall, it was a beautiful experience and I am very thankful for the opportunity. I hope you have as wonderful of a tomorrow as I did today.