In Rugby you can only pass backwards...

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March 25-April 5
Schoolwork and NC State drama have been the meat and potatoes of these weeks.
My workload has been kicked up a notch and I’ve been writing papers and doing assignments. I now know all about a genus of desert-adapted frogs in Australia. Soon I will be an expert on how the beach is a symbol of Australianness. I'm also learning how to do dental work on dogs, but I'm not getting graded on that.
We had a formal dinner March 29th. I had to buy a dress (should I post a picture? It was just a black dress), and shoes. We had mass beforehand, then drinks (gasp! alcohol at a college event!) outside the dining area. I had a glass of white wine, and then decided I didn’t really like drinking wine so much and switched to lemonade. So I improved my heart-health, but didn’t try to get smashed, unlike some others. The dining hall had formal settings and tablecloths, but the food was buffet-style and almost the same as normal. Dessert however was wonderful (I had a chocolate mousse concoction and tried some of Alice’s mango cheesecake). They also had rented a jukebox, so there was music and after dinner I danced a bit.
Daylight savings time ended March 30th. It immediately felt darker and became noticeably colder. Ew.
April Fools Day passed without incident (about the most interesting thing I did that day was dissect a squid and try to write my name with the inksac).
Drama happened mid-week. To make a long story short, I will probably not be an RA in the fall and I'm quite upset about it.
Anyhow, back to Australia. Friday night (April 5th) was fun; I went out to dinner with some friends. We went to this vegetarian Indian restaurant that they knew about. I loved it. It was the first spicy food I’d had in months. And the mango juice was a perfect counterpart to the spicy dishes. Yummy and healthy. And because they run off donations, you choose what you pay, which I found interesting. After dinner we walked around downtown (on Friday nights the city shops stay open until 9pm - I know you’re all amazed at the late hour) and window shopped. Then the girls I was with got gelato (I was really full, so just tasted theirs) and this ex-Israeli guy started chatting up Jennifer, whose mom is apparently from Israel. Well, this chatting lasted a long time. The stuff in English was interesting. Anyway, as the ice cream/gelato guy was closing up, he gave us these samples of one of his special creations: beer-flavored ice cream. Considering I don’t like beer, it wasn’t too bad. I wouldn’t buy a tub of it, but being in Australia it seems to make sense to me that someone would want beer-flavored ice cream. I think I prefer rum raisin, though.
Tomorrow I’m going to go play touch rugby to let off some Park-related steam. Too bad it’s only touch. (Note: Rugby is the most backwards game ever (no pun intended). AFL makes so much more sense to me.)

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Photos

Formal dinner
I didn't actually drag my camera to the formal dinner, so I relied on the kindness of others to document my presence.