mmmmm Delicious!

There are few things in life that we truly enjoy. For me, and the rest of the crew in Australia from LA, one of those things includes stuff that is free. To be a little more specific, I’m talking about FREE MEALS. Our entire week during orientation we attended meetings and group programmes and received free bags, pens, notepads, snacks, water bottles, even a poncho and mini sewing kit! But the best gifts were that of delicious breakfasts, lunches and dinners!

So, while Laura told you all about the awesome stuff we got to do during O-week here at UC, I’m going to give you a re-cap of our main goal of the week... attending as many free meals as possible.

Our first day all together (me, Laura, Dave and Marina) was Sunday. That night we heard about a free spit roast being thrown for the “freshers”. After considering ourselves “freshers” of the country, we joined in! It was amazing. For those of you unaware of what a spit roast is, it’s simply a pig roast (minus the creepy pig rotating on a stick on display for all to see) with fresh pork served with gravy that you can eat alone or on a bun (which is the best way). It was also served with greens, macaroni salad and some rice stuff with hot peppers. Marina made the mistake of putting what she thought was mustard on her sandwich which turned out to be wasabi sauce... YUMMM. After that delicious meal, deserts were put out on the table with a choice of passion fruit cheese cake or brownies with some kind of nuts in them. You ALL know which one I chose; Brownies hands down. After everyone had eaten and the catering crew was cleaning up, being the moochers we truly are, we took a plate full of desert goodies and Dave managed to get an entire extra plate heaped with pork!

On the first day of o-week we were busy attending so many meetings we may unfortunately missed out on a few free meals. We did get a free BBQ lunch called the “buddies BBQ” where we met our exchange buddies who were past exchange students. Chips were also handed out which were awesome but that day I think I ate more ice than anything else... it was a scorching 38 degrees Celsius outside with a clear sunny sky. After one of our OSHC meetings, pizza was up for grabs as well. Later that night, all the exchange students met up at the Lighthouse Pub, otherwise known as “The Lighty” where we were all given free beer and cider!

The next day was one full of free meals. Our breakfast was comprised of pancakes with syrup in the concord outside the UC refectory (or student centre), which was also served with apple black currant drinking boxes.  Lunch was a bit later in the same place where we were given what I’m assuming was beef with gravy, rice and veggies with a delicious pasta side. No drinks came with this meal but it was so delicious no one had time to think about drinks before finishing their plates. Our poor friend Mark was ripped off when he showed up late and was given two tiny pieces of beef and a few pasta noodles. Dinner was the best of all the meals. Even though we had to wait for it a bit longer than most other tables, we were given fries and pizza during trivia night in the refectory. The fries were perfect and the pizza was interesting and different, but delicious!

As the week progressed o-week activities were more spread apart and free meals were less frequent. Laura and I attended one more free lunch of sausages, bread, salad and.... COCA COLA! I was so happy to be given free pop.

While free food was an amazing bonus to o-week, my favourite part about UC’s orientation programme was the opportunity to meet new people. If not for these crazy meetings and free meal get-togethers we would have never met our huge crew of Canadians, not to mention all the crazy Australians we’ve met along the way as well. I only hope to keep learning as much about Australia and the Aussie culture as I can from all the new people we meet along our journey.

Well, that’s it for now. We’re going to the zoo tomorrow and with all the crazy animals we’ve seen here so far, you will all hear about them very soon! Hope you’re not all super hungry now,

Cheers,

Mandy