Goals While In Australia: 1.) pet a kangaroo...CHECK.

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That's right...if you had any doubts that I was actually IN Australia, my photographic proof of Australian cuddly creatures should set you straight. Eric’s camera took some of the better pictures so I’ll have to wait on those for later…
After a long, hectic couple of weeks of waking up early, going to class, going to work, and (sometimes) going BACK to class, I was definitely ready for some time off. I also got SUPER sick (of course…) starting last Friday so I’m happy to be healthy once again = ) Now I’ve finally transitioned to 4 hours a week at the bookshop which is going to be VERY relaxing…except I finally got my paperwork to fill out…IT’S THE BIGGEST STACK OF PAPER I’VE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE. It came in this GIANT folder and had two huge “employee handbooks” and approximately 80 bajillion papers to sign. I haven’t actually been brave enough to start doing any of it yet, especially because apparently I have to send out for an Australian tax number…joy.
As for the wildlife park, the pictures pretty much speak for themselves, but essentially we hopped on a bus with the rest of the US kids and drove about 40 minutes to Caversham wildlife reserve where they keep all sorts of Australian critters. They had a big enclosure where a bunch of kangaroos were relaxing like models (honestly…they rest with their legs crossed so they look “photo-shoot-ready”…Eric even named one of them “Paris” and apparently made some sort of deal with it about a reality show…I think it was “Australia’s next top-roo” if I’m not mistaken…) I even found a few “Mommy-roo’s” which had little Joey’s folded up in their pouches…except they don’t look like the cartoon versions with their heads cutely sticking out of the horizontally-slit pouch(think Roo from Winnie the Pooh) but instead the opening to the pouch is more vertically slit and usually all you can see are the Joey’s back legs or tail sticking out…still pretty darn cute tho ; ) Along with kangaroos, we went to a Koala enclosure where we found a bunch of sleeping balls of fluff…and another baby in a pouch : ) The rest of the wildlife park’s animals were in cages…minus the farm animals (note: see GOAT ATTACK picture) which weren’t quite as exciting as the roos and koalas.
Nothing else especially interesting to report; and I’ll probably have even less next week because EVERYONE is ABANDONING ME = ( There is a business trip to Singapore in which essentially all the other ND students and Eric are going on. I’m not exactly sure what I will be doing to entertain myself, but I’m sure I’ll figure something out…after all, there are A LOT of cute boutiques in Freo…hmmm…
Well, that’s all for now. Enjoy the kangaroo pictures!

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